Opinion
No. CV 06-5006735 S
March 6, 2007
MEMORANDUM OF DECISION
The defendants have filed a Motion to Strike the plaintiff's complaint which is in two counts. The first count is directed against the Town of Manchester and the second count is against Mark Carlino an employee of the Town of Manchester.
Paragraph 6 of the complaint sets forth the allegation of negligence as follows:
6. At said meeting, the Plaintiff produced a map detailing the location of an underground drainpipe on the Plaintiff's property; Defendant Town of Manchester's employee, Mark Carlino negligently refused to investigate said underground pipe as a possible solution to the aforementioned drainage problem and negligently refused to allow the Plaintiff to utilize said underground drainage pipe.
The parties agree that the complaint of act is discretionary in nature, however, to avoid the doctrine of governmental immunity, the plaintiff claims that the complaint alleges sufficient facts to fall within the imminent harm exception. This exception applies when the circumstances make it apparent to a public official that his failure to act would be likely to subject an identifiable person imminent harm Violano v. Fernandez, 280 Conn. 310.
In Evon v. Andrews, 211 Conn. 508, the court found that the exception did not apply relative to an apartment house fire finding that the class of possible victims of an unspecified fire that may occur at some unspecified time in the future are not identified persons and the harm there was not imminent. See also Bysewicz v. City of Middletown, 2006 WL 3860898, Conn.Super.
The instant case is similar to Evon v. Andrews, supra, in that the risk in question implicates a wide range of factors that can occur, if at all, at some unspecified time in the future.
The harm in the instant case does not fall within the imminent harm exception, therefore, the Motion to Strike is granted.