Ulanoff v. Becker Salon, LLC

Citations

• 208 Conn. App. 1

Syllabus

The plaintiff sought to recover damages from the defendants, a salon and one of its owners, for injuries that she sustained when she walked into the glass doors at the entrance of the salon while attempting to enter the premises. Prior to trial, the defendants filed a motion in limine, seeking to prevent the plaintiff from entering into evidence a photograph of the entrance to the salon, which she had obtained from the salon's website. The photograph depicted the glass doors without any signage or handles. The defendants claimed that the photograph was irrelevant and unduly prejudicial, as it had been taken long after the date of the accident and had been photoshopped to remove signage and the handles from the doors. The trial court granted the defendants' motion. At trial, one of the plaintiff's witnesses, S, testified that she had helped to deco- rate the salon prior to its opening, approximately three weeks before the plaintiff's accident. Following the objection of the defendants' coun- sel, the trial court precluded the plaintiff from asking S about the appear- ance of the salon's entrance when she had been working there, including whether the doors had signage or handles. The jury returned a verdict for the defendants, and the trial court rendered judgment for the defendants, from which the plaintiff appealed to this court. Held: 1. The trial court improperly granted the defendants' motion to preclude the plaintiff from offering into evidence the photograph obtained from the salon's website: the defendants' counsel conceded that the trial court erred in determining that the plaintiff needed to establish the chain of custody of the photograph prior to introducing it into evidence; more- over, it was indisputable that the photograph was relevant, as it depicted the salon's doors, the appearance of which was central to the plaintiff's case; furthermore, the plaintiff had personal knowledge of the entrance to the salon and was prepared to testify that the photogra