delivered the opinion of the court.
Plаintiff appeals from the dismissal of Count Two of her Second Amended Complaint for failure to state a cause of action and the entry of final judgment in favor of defendants. 1
The complaint alleges that defendant operated a private housing project containing about 69 apartment buildings, in one of which plaintiff was a tenant in a first-floor аpartment. 2 Defendant maintained a private police force which was represented to the tenants of the project “as giving a special and added prоtection to the security and safety of the occupants.” In the housing project thеre had been a series of break-ins, burglaries and rapes which were known to the defеndant. (It is not alleged that plaintiff was unaware of these crimes.) On August 31, 1960, underneath the window of plaintiff’s apartment, a David Hudson was arrested for carrying a concealed knife. (It is nоt alleged that defendant knew of this incident nor is it alleged that plaintiff was unaware thereof.) Defendant failed to warn plaintiff and to provide protection for her. As a direct result of this alleged negligence, on September 23, 1960, the same David Hudson entered plaintiff’s apartment through a window and assaulted and forcibly raped her. Plaintiff sustained injuries as a result, and she seeks damages of $200,000.
Defendant filed a motion to strike, and, after hearing, the court entered the order from which this appeal has been taken.
Plaintiff’s theоry is that defendant knew or should have known that plaintiff was in a position of danger; that by emрloying a private police force defendant assumed a duty to warn plaintiff and to use reasonable care to protect her from criminal activities.
The liberal construction which we believe must be afforded to a litigant in determining the sufficiency of his pleading (Kita v. YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago, 47 Ill App2d 409,
To state a cause of actiоn for a breach of duty, the duty must first be alleged, and, in a case such as this, the undertaking of defеndant must be set forth if there is to be actionable negligence for its violation. Nelson v. Union Wire Rope Corp., 39 Ill App2d 73, 121,
The undertaking alleged (that defendant’s private police would give a special and added prоtection to the security and safety of its tenants) cannot reasonably be construеd as insurance of absolute protection against crime. Even the assignment of an аrmed personal bodyguard with full police authority (which defendant did not have) could not guаrantee such a result.
The heart of plaintiff’s complaint appears to be that when Hudson was arrested near her window on the charge of carrying a concealed weapon (about two weeks before her rape), defendant should have wаrned her of the incident and failed to do so. Without deciding whether proximate causе of the rape could thereby be adequately alleged, 3 it is sufficient to note the аbsence in the complaint of any allegation that defendant did, or that plaintiff did not, knоw of this incident prior to the occurrence of the rape.
Every opportunity wаs given plaintiff to amend her complaint. The revisions embodied in the second amendеd complaint did not add sufficient substance to state a cause of action. The order of the trial court is therefore affirmed.
Affirmed.
Notes
The only other count of the complaint, Count One, was dismissed by agreement in the trial court.
All statements in this paragraph of the opinion are based on allegations of the Second Amended Complaint.
We doubt that tbe giving of this warning, under all the circumstances alleged, would have lessened the probability of the crime, or that the failure so to notify plaintiff would have increased the hazard in any way. Rollins v. General American Transp. Corp., 46 Ill App2d 266, 271,
On this question the nonliability cases involving the maintenance of burglar alarms or watchmen’s supervisory systems would be of interest. For example: Libby, McNeill & Libby v. Illinois Dist. Tel. Co., 294 Ill App 93,