Isaac v. Mount Sinai Hosp., 2505
Citation | 3 Conn.App. 598,490 A.2d 1024 |
Decision Date | 23 April 1985 |
Docket Number | No. 2505,2505 |
Court | Appellate Court of Connecticut |
Parties | Deborah J. ISAAC, Administratrix (ESTATE OF Redgnard ISAAC) v. MOUNT SINAI HOSPITAL et al. |
Richard A. Bieder, Bridgeport, with whom, on the brief, was Brenda C. Morrissey, Bridgeport, for appellee (plaintiff).
Andrew J. O'Keefe, West Hartford, with whom were Maureen A. Sullivan, Hartford, and, on the brief, Denise M. Phelan, Hartford, for appellee (defendant Anesthesia Associates, P.C.).
April Haskell, Hartford, for appellee (named defendant).
Louis B. Blumenfeld, Hartford, for appellee (defendant St. Francis Hosp.).
Lois Tanzer, Hartford, for appellee (defendant Richard Weltman).
Before DUPONT, C.P.J., and HULL and SPALLONE, JJ.
This is an appeal from the dismissal of a wrongful death action brought pursuant to General Statutes § 52-555. 1
The decedent, Redgnard Isaac, died on April 20, 1979, while a patient at the defendant Mount Sinai Hospital. On March 30, 1981, the plaintiff, who is the decedent's daughter, filed a wrongful death action in which she alleged negligence in the treatment of the decedent by Mount Sinai Hospital and by the other defendants, St. Francis Hospital, physician Richard B. Weltman and Anesthesia Associates, P.C. The plaintiff also alleged in the complaint that she had been appointed administratrix of the decedent's estate on or about May 17, 1979. In the summer of 1982, she apparently discovered that she had only been authorized under General Statutes § 45-266 to handle survivorship property and had not, in fact, been appointed as administratrix. She was ultimately appointed administratrix of the decedent's estate on September 28, 1982.
On February 4, 1983, Anesthesia Associates, P.C., moved to dismiss the action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. The motion to dismiss, in which the other defendants joined, rested on the ground that the plaintiff had failed to comply with the requirement of General Statutes § 52-555, which provides that an "executor or administrator" may recover thereunder. On March 25, 1983, the plaintiff requested permission to amend her complaint to reflect that she had been duly appointed administratrix of the estate on September 28, 1982, and moved to be substituted, in her capacity as administratrix, as party plaintiff. The trial court granted the motion to dismiss and the plaintiff appealed.
The trial court correctly considered the defendants' motion to dismiss before reaching the plaintiff's request to amend and motion to substitute. When a question of jurisdiction is brought to the court's attention, that issue must be resolved before the court can move on to other matters. Baldwin Piano & Organ Co. v. Blake, 186 Conn. 295, 297-98, 441 A.2d 183 (1982). This would appear to be particularly true where the question raised concerns subject matter, as opposed to personal, jurisdiction. See id., 298-99, 441 A.2d 183 (Peters, J., concurring).
Estate of Schoeller v. Becker, 33 Conn.Sup. 79, 79-80, 360 A.2d 905 (1975).
General Statutes § 52-555 creates a cause of action that may be maintained only by an executor or administrator of an estate. Keogh v. Bridgeport, 187 Conn. 53, 58, 444 A.2d 225 (1982). Cofrancesco v. Smith, 29 Conn.Sup. 139, 141-42, 275 A.2d 608 (1971).
Under General Statutes § 52-555, standing to bring a wrongful death action is thus conferred only upon either an executor or an administrator. By the defendants' motion, the plaintiff's standing to request an adjudication has been challenged. Mystic Marine Life Aquarium, Inc. v. Gill, 175 Conn. 483, 492, 400 A.2d 726 (1978). The focus is properly upon the party wishing to get his complaint before the court and not upon the issues he wishes to have adjudicated. Berlin v. Santaguida, 181 Conn. 421, 423, 435 A.2d 980 (1980).
At the time the plaintiff brought this action, she erroneously alleged that she brought it as the administratrix of the decedent's estate. The plaintiff was not issued letters of administration, however, until September 28, 1982, more...
To continue reading
Request your trial-
Am. Tax Funding, LLC v. Design Land Developers of Newtown, Inc.
...a legal existence, it can neither sue nor be sued." (Citations omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Isaac v. Mount Sinai Hospital , 3 Conn. App. 598, 600, 490 A.2d 1024, cert. denied, 196 Conn. 807, 494 A.2d 904 (1985) ; see also Estate of Rock v. University of Connecticut , 323 Conn......
-
Ecker v. Town of West Hartford, 12971
......& New Haven R.R. Co., 25 Conn. 265, 273 (1856); Isaac v. Mount Sinai Hospital, 3 Conn.App. 598, 601-602, 490 A.2d ......
-
United States v. All Funds in the Account of Prop. Futures, Inc.
...or any other procedural rule for that matter, and the cases cited by Marrakush in support of its pronouncement, Isaac v. Mount Sinai Hospital, 3 Conn.App. 598, 490 A.2d 1024, cert. denied, 196 Conn. 807, 494 A.2d 904 (1985)(“It is elemental that in order to confer jurisdiction on the court ......
-
Bey v. Stumpf
...plaintiff cannot be deemed existing if it] is neither a natural nor artificial person, but is merely a name.’ Isaac v. Mount Sinai Hospital, 3 Conn.App. 598, 600, 490 A.2d 1024, cert. denied, 196 Conn. 807, 494 A.2d 904 (1985) (citing 59 Am.Jur.2d, Parties, §§ 20, 21); see also De Paul Comm......