Morton v. Syriac

Citations

• 196 Conn. App. 183

Syllabus

The plaintiff sought a temporary and permanent injunction to, inter alia, prevent the defendant, her former husband, from limiting her access to a shared driveway, and for other relief. Pursuant to a separation agree- ment that was incorporated into the parties' dissolution judgment, the defendant quitclaimed his ownership interest in certain real property to the plaintiff, including an area known as the east branch. He provided an express easement that allowed the plaintiff to reach her quitclaimed property with access over the shared driveway on the property that he retained, known as the west branch, until he installed a similar driveway for her to use on the east branch. The plaintiff's property is landlocked without access to a right-of-way over either the east branch or the west branch. The plaintiff's and the defendant's properties lie northerly of and abut a portion of a discontinued highway known as the Old Connecti- cut Path. The defendant repeatedly obstructed the plaintiff's access to the quitclaimed property by various means, including placing objects, such as boulders and a gate, across the shared driveway. The trial court rendered judgment in favor of the plaintiff, granting her a permanent injunction, from which the defendant appealed to this court. Thereafter, the trial court denied the defendant's motions to open and to disqual- ify. Held: 1. The defendant could not prevail on his claim that the trial court wrongly issued a permanent injunction: a. Although, as the defendant claimed, the plaintiff did not allege irrepara- ble harm or lack of an adequate remedy at law, the complaint provided adequate notice of the plaintiff's claim for a permanent injunction: the plaintiff explicitly sought a permanent injunction in her prayer for relief and clearly alleged that the defendant had consistently impeded her ability to use the shared driveway to access her property; moreover, the complaint further explained that the plaintiff asserted her right to use t