In re Police Case Numbers: Meriden PD 20-003903, 20-005055 & Berlin PD 2020-11662

Syllabus

An individual, L, sought to quash a search and seizure warrant in connection with a police matter in Meriden. The trial court dismissed L's motions on the ground that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction because there was no pending criminal action against L, and L appealed to this court. Subsequently, L was arrested via an arrest warrant with the same police case number as was on the search and seizure warrant. Because L was charged with a class A felony, the matter was transferred from the part B docket in Meriden to the part A docket in New Haven. On L's appeal, held: the appeal was dismissed as moot as the relief sought on appeal, a hearing on the merits of the motions, is available to L in the pending criminal action, which stemmed from the same investigation that prompted the search warrant at issue in the appeal; moreover, no practi- cal relief would follow from a determination as to the trial court's jurisdiction to consider those claims in the absence of a pending criminal action; furthermore, although L claimed that the appeal involved the Meriden court that issued the search warrant and not the New Haven court where the criminal action is pending, the search warrant L sought to quash and the arrest warrant in the criminal action both have the same Meriden police case number and were issued in connection with the same investigation. Argued May 18—officially released September 6, 2022