Allard v. City of Hartford
| Citation | 151 Conn. 284,197 A.2d 69 |
| Court | Supreme Court of Connecticut |
| Decision Date | 08 January 1964 |
| Parties | Helen S. ALLARD, Administratrix (ESTATE of Harvey E. ALLARD) v. CITY OF HARTFORD et al. Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut |
Leo Parskey, Hartford, for appellant (plaintiff).
William P. Aspell, Hartford, with whom, on the brief, were George Muir, Hartford, and Edward J. Foley, E. Hartford, for appellees (defendants Beckwith et al.); with him also were Jerome Malliet, Corp. Counsel, and, on the brief, Richard W. Shettle, Asst. Corp. Counsel, for appellee (named defendant).
Before KING, C. J., and MURPHY, SHEA, ALCORN and COMLEY, JJ.
The plaintiff is the administrix of the estate of her husband, Harvey E. Allard, who died on July 31, 1960, following major brain surgery. She alleged that her husband was assaulted by two members of the Hartford police department and that they fractured his skull and inflicted other critical injuries to his head which made the operation necessary. She brought suit against these two officers and seven other members of the Hartford police department as well as the city of Hartford, seeking damages for his death. The case was tried to the jury, who returned a verdict for the defendants. The court denied the plaintiff's motion to set the verdict aside. The plaintiff has appealed from the judgment.
The cause of action was set out in three counts. In the first count, the plaintiff alleged an assault by Michael Gregory and Marshall Hopkins, police officers. In the second count, which again alleged that Gregory and Hopkins assaulted and injured her husband, she sought recovery from them and seven other members of the police department, including the chief of police, for negligence in the manner in which her husband had been arrested; in failing to observe his physical condition and to obtain proper medical care; in permitting him to be manhandled; and in the failure of the superior officer to instruct subordinates to handle intoxicated or injured prisoners properly. The third count was directed against all of the individual defendants and the city. All of the allegations of the second count were incorporated in the third count together with additional allegations by which the plaintiff attempted to hold all of the defendants liable under General Statutes, § 7-465, which imposes an indemnitor's liability on the city under certain conditions if the injuries were caused, without wilfulness or wantonness, by a municipal employee while performing his official duties. Martyn v. Donlin, 148 Conn. 27, 32, 166 A.2d 856. After the parties rested, the defendants moved for a directed verdict. The court granted the motion as to all of the defendants except Gregory and Hopkins. The case against these two under the first two counts was submitted to the jury, who found for them and by direction for all of the other defendants. The court denied the plaintiff's motion to set aside the verdict. Error has not been assigned in the denial of the motion. Consequently, the error claimed in the direction of the verdict cannot be considered. See Practice Book, 1963, § 605.
The finding of the claims of proof has not been challenged. It recites that the plaintiff offered evidence to prove and claimed to have proved the following: On July 29, 1960, Allard had been drinking. A neighbor, at the plaintiff's request, took him to his room, but he shortly returned to the street. In some unexplained manner, he fell and struck the back of his head on the sidewalk. leaving a blood mark on the sidewalk. He was then carried to his room. Raymond Rubenbauer, a police officer, was called to the scene and found Allard on a couch in his room. He was bleeding from a cut on the back of his head. As the officer turned from Allard to telephone for an ambulance, Allard attacked the officer, who retreated from the room, descended to the street level and called for assistance. Other police officers, Roger Brisson, Robert Miller, Theodore Napper and Vincent Supple, arrived to assist Rubenbauer. As the officers attempted to ascend the stairs to the Allard apartment on the third floor, Allard drove them off by hurling milk bottles down the stairway. To avoid injury from the breaking glass, the officers retreated to the street, whereupon Allard voluntarily descended and surrendered. He was handcuffed, placed in a partrol wagon in the custody of Marshall Hopkins and Peter Denisky, police officers, and taken to the booking office at the Hartford police station. According to a witness, Joseph Butterfield, who was present in the booking office, Gregory and Hopkins assaulted Allard in the booking office, and Allard was knocked to the floor, striking his head on the floor, and was further shaken about on a bench in the office. Rendered unconscious and in a coma, he was taken to the McCook Hospital and from there to the Hartford Hospital, where despite brain surgery he died from a massive cerebral edema. Hospital records reveal that he had two parallel four-inch scalp lacerations in the occipital area, a fracture of the right occipital bone, a laceration of the left parietal area of the brain about one by one and one-half inches, a one-inch contusion of the right frontal lobe, and subdural and subarachnoid hemorrhage.
The defendants offered evidence to prove and claimed to have proved the following: Allard suffered a fractured skull at the time of his fall on the sidewalk before his arrest. At the booking office, he collapsed while being booked. Attempts to revive him failed, and a physician was called. The physician ordered him hospitalized. The conditions found upon surgery and in the postmortem examination of Allard were consistent with the results which might be expected from a fall on the sidewalk with force great enough to produce a laceration and fractured skull. The defendants also claimed: The plaintiff's case depended solely on the credibility of the witness Butterfield, who admitted on the stand that he had lied in several respects while testifying under oath before the coroner. Butterfield also admitted that he had, on the witness stand, made a false statement with respect to a document which was shown to him during cross-examination. Evidence concerning his arrest record was originally introduced without objection by the plaintiff. After Butterfield that he had been arrested six or seven times, the plaintiff objected to...
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