Pirri v. Chow

Citations

• 231 Conn. App. 493

Syllabus

The defendant appealed from the trial court's judgment rendered in favor of the substitute plaintiff, the executor of the plaintiff's estate, on her claim of adverse possession with respect to a portion of the defendant's property. The defendant claimed that the trial court clearly erred in finding that the plaintiff had adversely possessed the disputed area under a claim of right. Held: Although the trial court's finding that the plaintiff had installed a new fence at the edge of the disputed area shortly after 1985 was clearly erroneous, the error was harmless because the court made only a single reference in its opinion to the fence being erected in 1985, it in no way suggested that such fact was central to its analysis or impacted its findings as to other facts, and the other evidence in the record demonstrated that the plaintiff used the disputed area as his own without permission from the record owner continuously from 1985 to 2018. The trial court's finding that the plaintiff possessed the disputed area under a claim of right was not clearly erroneous because the evidence was suffi- cient to support the finding, and it was not the role of this court to second- guess the trial court's credibility determinations or to reweigh conflicting evi- dence. Argued January 9—officially released March 25, 2025