Newtown v. Gaydosh

Citations

• 211 Conn. App. 186

Syllabus

The defendants appealed to this court from the judgment of the trial court granting the plaintiffs' motion for contempt. The defendants owned property that was located in the plaintiff town. In 2009, the plaintiffs commenced the underlying action seeking injunctive relief to compel the defendants to comply with certain zoning regulations. The parties entered into a joint stipulation, which, inter alia, prohibited the defen- dants from selling or having taken from the property by truck, or in any way removing from the property any soil, sand, gravel, clay, rock, or other earth material, and the trial court rendered judgment in accordance with the stipulation. Thereafter, the plaintiffs filed several postjudgment motions for contempt alleging that the defendants had violated the terms of the stipulated judgment. The trial court granted the plaintiffs' first motion, filed in 2011, and entered certain orders. Following the plaintiffs' second motion for contempt, filed in 2013, the trial court ordered the parties to conduct periodic meetings at the property to monitor the defendants' compliance with the judgment. When the town was satisfied that the defendants were in compliance with the judgment, the plaintiffs withdrew their motion. In 2018, the plaintiffs received several complaints about noise and excess truck traffic on the property. In response, the plaintiffs took aerial photographs of the property in January, 2019, which depicted construction equipment and stockpiles of construction materi- als on the property. The plaintiffs filed their third motion for contempt, the resolution of which served as the basis for the present appeal. The court found that the defendants had wilfully violated the judgment by using the property for commercial rock mining and construction related operations and they had concealed their noncompliance with the judg- ment. The court granted the motion and imposed sanctions against the defendants, including a $13,800 fine, a conditional fin