Cooke v. Commissioner of Correction

Citations

• 194 Conn. App. 807

Syllabus

The petitioner sought a writ of habeas corpus, claiming that his trial counsel provided ineffective assistance. The habeas court rendered judgment denying the habeas petition and, thereafter, denied the petition for certifi- cation to appeal, and the petitioner appealed to this court. The petitioner subsequently filed an application for a fee waiver and attached thereto an affidavit requesting certification of additional issues on appeal. Although the waiver application was granted, the court did not initially rule on the petitioner's request for certification of additional issues on appeal, and the petitioner subsequently filed a motion for articulation requesting that the court rule on his request, which the court treated as a motion to amend the petition for certification and granted. On appeal, the respondent Commissioner of Correction claimed that the habeas court, having previously denied the petition for certification to appeal, lacked jurisdiction to allow the petitioner to amend his petition for certification to appeal. Held: 1. The respondent's claim that the habeas court lacked jurisdiction to allow the petitioner to amend his petition for certification to appeal was unavailing: that court's ruling did not implicate the four month jurisdic- tional limit of the applicable rule of practice (§ 17-4) because courts have continuing jurisdiction to fashion appropriate remedies pursuant to their inherent powers, and its ruling allowing the petitioner to amend his petition for certification to appeal was merely a clarification of an ambiguity in the record concerning which claims the petitioner had preserved for appeal, and although the petitioner timely raised claims in his petition for certification to appeal and his waiver application, the court had ruled on only the former, and the issues raised in his applica- tion went unaddressed by the court, through no fault of the petitioner, until he filed a motion for articulation; accordingly, the court did not open