Doe v. New Haven

Citations

• 214 Conn. App. 553

Syllabus

The plaintiff sought to recover damages from the defendants, the city of New Haven, the city's board of education and J, a high school principal, for injuries he allegedly sustained as a result of sexual abuse by F, a theater teacher at the high school. F supervised and directed an extracurricular school play in which the plaintiff had a part. F occasion- ally met with the plaintiff and other students involved in the play for one-on-one singing and acting lessons. Although J did not know that F met with students privately for lessons, other employees at the high school were aware of those meetings. F sent text messages from her personal cell phone to the plaintiff and other students about matters related to the play. The conversations between F and the plaintiff eventu- ally became more intimate, and the plaintiff began going to F's classroom in the mornings before classes started and they would kiss. The plaintiff, along with other students at the high school, was enrolled in afternoon classes at an arts center and therefore was dismissed from the high school at 12:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday. One Friday, when the plaintiff did not have classes at the arts center, he went to F's classroom after his last class ended at 12:30 p.m. and she performed oral sex on him. On another day, the plaintiff and F went to an adjacent dressing room adjoining the auditorium stage. A security guard entered the dress- ing room and discovered them; the police and high school administration were immediately notified and an investigation ensued. The plaintiff alleged, inter alia, that the defendants failed to supervise employees and classrooms and teachers' use of cell phones. The plaintiff further alleged that J violated a ministerial duty to report suspected child abuse under the mandatory reporting statutes (§ 17a-101 et seq.) because she had reasonable cause to suspect that, prior to the incident between the plaintiff and F in the dressing room, the plaintiff or other students we