MUNICIPAL LAW: Appellate Court holds employee of contract vendor not within class of identifiable victims to defeat discretionary act governmental immunity

The Appellate Court upholds a ruling granting summary judgment to the city of Norwich under governmental immunity, affirming that the city could not be liable to an employee of a vendor who fell on ice while making a delivery at a public school.

The Appellate Court found that the act of removing snow and ice from a walkway or delivery ramp is not ministerial in nature and so immunity applies to the city.  The Court noted that no policy or directive existed that would render the act ministerial in nature, therefore, summary judgment was appropriate.

The plaintiff argued that he was an identifiable victim within the meaning of governmental immunity jurisprudence to trigger an exception to discretionary act immunity.  The Court declined to extend the identifiable victim exception beyond the narrow confines of children who are statutorily compelled to be on school grounds during school hours.  The Court reasoned that the Supreme Court has established a very narrow rule as to an identifiable victim to include only those compelled to be somewhere and where the plaintiff was only contractually bound and not required by law to be on the school grounds, the narrow exception does not apply.

Andrzej Kusy v. City of Norwich, Et al., — A.3d –, 2019 WL 4008942 (Conn. App. August 27, 2019)