A voice recognition emergency system and method. The system includes a microphone, a speaker, and a voice recognition emergency device. The device includes a processor and a transmitter. The processor analyzes sound received from the microphone, detects when an emergency phrase has been spoken, and conveys an alert condition to a gateway via the transmitter in response to detecting the emergency phrase has been spoken. The processor recognizes pre-defined, spoken emergency phrases and triggers an alert condition in response to detecting that one of the emergency phrases was spoken. The device continuously listens through the microphone for any one of the pre-defined phrases, in response to which an alert condition is conveyed to the gateway device. The alert condition is conveyed to the gateway device through Power Line Communications (PLC), radio communications, Wi-Fi communications, or Ethernet communications. The processor may recognize an emergency phrase spoken by a particular person.