Carol Allen v. Laura Sitrin, as Finance Director of the City of Newport

Syllabus

In these consolidated appeals, the plaintiff, Carol Allen individually, and in her capacity as Administratrix for the Estate of Kenneth MacDuff, and the defendants, Laura Sitrin, Finance Director for the City of Newport (the city), Donald Botelho, and Ben Bona (collectively, the city defendants), cross-appealed from two amended judgments of the Superior Court entered in favor of the plaintiff following a nonjury trial. The city defendants argued, in pertinent part, that the trial justice erred by finding that the Connecticut Rule did not apply when the plaintiff slipped and fell upon an accumulated slushy film because \there was not a sufficient accumulation of snow or ice on the steps where [the plaintiff] fell to [in]voke the Connecticut Rule.\ The city defendants further argued that the trial justice erred in finding, in the alternative, that the unusual circumstances exception to the Connecticut Rule applied. The Supreme Court held that the Superior Court erred in failing to apply the Connecticut Rule because the application of the rule depends upon whether the plaintiff slipped upon accumulated snow or ice, rather than the extent of the accumulation. Additionally, the Supreme Court held that the unusual circumstances exception did not apply because the city defendants did not take any affirmative actions that resulted in increasing the risk of traveling during a storm. Accordingly, the Supreme Court vacated the judgment of the Superior Court and remanded for entry of judgment in favor of the city defendants.