John P. Cotter

The case involved property owners who sought injunctive relief to prevent the City of Milford from enforcing its Housing Code against sixteen vacant residential properties, after city inspectors found code violations, posted the dwellings as unfit for occupancy, and pursued arrest warrants for noncompliance. The owners argued that the local code did not apply to vacant properties, was preempted by the State Building Code, and lacked adequate standards, while the city maintained that the properties qualified as dwellings because the owners intended to renovate and occupy them. The trial court credited the owners' intent, treated the properties as dwellings, dissolved the temporary injunction, and denied permanent relief without addressing preemption. The appellate court ruled that the trial court erred by failing to decide the preemption issue, which had been squarely presented in the pleadings and arguments, because a local ordinance must yield to conflicting state law on the same subject matter.

propertybusiness & regulatoryprocedure

This case concerned whether prepayments received by a computer equipment lessor in June 1975 for leases extending beyond July 1, 1975, were subject to Connecticut's new sales and use tax on leases of tangible personal property, which became effective on that date. The court held that such payments were taxable. The statute's definition of gross receipts includes payments for the term of any lease occurring on or after July 1, 1975, and the tax applies based on the period of use rather than the timing of payment receipt or lease signing. The court reasoned that the statutory language unambiguously ties the tax to the lease term after the effective date, rendering prepayment timing irrelevant.

taxesbusiness & regulatory

The case concerned the scope of the term 'court records' under General Statutes § 54-142a (d), which mandates erasure (including physical destruction upon request) of police, court, and prosecutorial records following a pardon. After receiving an absolute pardon, the plaintiff sued to compel the Department of Correction to destroy all prison-related records in its custody, arguing they stemmed from court documents like the mittimus. The court held that only records created or maintained by or for the court qualify as 'court records' subject to destruction, specifically including the mittimus, presentence investigation report, and sentencing transcript, but not internal prison records such as medical or administrative files. It reasoned that the statute's plain language limits 'court records' to those connected to court proceedings from commencement to termination, without extending to analogous or derivative materials held by other agencies.

criminal lawprocedure

The plaintiffs sued the Town of Westport alleging various torts arising from town officials entering their land and removing or destroying a small dam on multiple occasions, seeking damages and injunctive relief. After the trial court sustained a demurrer to the original seventeen-count complaint, the plaintiffs filed a substitute complaint that contained no new matter; the court then granted the defendant's request to revise by deleting the substitute complaint in its entirety and rendered judgment for the defendant. On appeal, the plaintiffs challenged the demurrer ruling and the lack of further opportunity to plead, but the court held that filing the substitute complaint waived any appeal from the demurrer under established precedent and that the request to revise was properly used to eliminate a repetitive pleading. The court found error only in the form of the judgment, which should have reflected the deletion of the substitute complaint rather than a failure to plead further, and directed the trial court to render a corrected judgment for the defendant on that basis.

proceduretorts & liabilityproperty

The plaintiff sued the defendants for personal injuries from a fall in their parking lot on December 19, 1974, claiming she stepped into a pothole. A jury returned a general verdict for the defendants. On appeal, the plaintiff argued error in the trial court's jury charge about her use of a cane during trial, which noted a lack of medical evidence linking the cane to her injuries, and in permitting the defendants' meteorologist to testify as an expert that the ground was not frozen on the date of the fall. The court held there was no error, reasoning that because the verdict absolved the defendants of liability, any claimed error relating to damages from the cane instruction was irrelevant, and the trial court did not abuse its discretion in qualifying the meteorologist as an expert on ground conditions based on his experience and weather records. The court affirmed the judgment.

torts & liabilityprocedure

The case involved Connecticut Natural Gas Corporation's appeal from a Public Utilities Control Authority (PUCA) decision granting only a partial rate increase of about $1.78 million instead of the requested $9.6 million. The Superior Court reviewed claims that the PUCA violated administrative procedure rules by relying on an unrebutted expert report from consultant James Rothschild without allowing the company to cross-examine him, and that it made errors in calculating working capital lag, federal tax rates and savings from consolidated returns, peak demand, purchased gas costs, and interest on refunds. The court ordered the PUCA to permit cross-examination of Rothschild, redo multiple specific calculations on taxes, capital, and other items using proper methods, and rejected arguments that a later 1979 rate increase had mooted the appeal. Its reasoning centered on requirements under the Uniform Administrative Procedure Act for contested cases, including the right to present evidence, cross-examine witnesses, and rebut extra-record evidence, as well as the substantial evidence standard for reviewing agency decisions.

business & regulatoryproceduretaxes