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DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW — NOT FINAL

Colchester Estate Ventures, LLC v. Madden, 229 Conn. App. 811 (2024)

Citation
Colchester Estate Ventures, LLC v. Madden, 229 Conn. App. 811 (2024)
Parent Document
Colchester Estate Ventures, LLC v. Madden, 229 Conn. App. 811 (2024)
Jurisdiction
Connecticut (state)
Effective Date
2024-12-24

Other Sections in This Document (26)

Full Text

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quotation marks omitted.) Doe v. Bemer, 215 Conn. App.
         504, 513–14, 283 A.3d 1074 (2022).
            A plaintiff’s broad authority pursuant to § 52-80 to
         unilaterally withdraw an action, however, ‘‘does not
         automatically extend to the plaintiff the additional right
         to commence an essentially identical action following
         that withdrawal if the primary purpose for doing so is
         to undermine an order of the court rendered in the
         prior litigation or if the withdrawal and subsequent
         refiling implicates a substantial right that vested in
         another party to the litigation and that likely will be
         jeopardized should the plaintiff proceed with the new
         action. . . . In either instance, if seasonably requested
         by the defendant or other third party, the court should
         exercise its discretion to restore the original action
         to the docket.’’ (Citation omitted; footnote omitted.)
         Palumbo v. Barbadimos, supra, 163 Conn. App. 115–16.
         ‘‘[A] ‘vested right’ in this context simply refers to a right
         acquired and presently held by a party to the withdrawn
         action that would be injuriously affected as a result of
         the withdrawal.’’ Id., 113 n.13.
            Practice Book § 10-55 provides in relevant part that
         the plaintiff’s withdrawal of an action after the defen-
         dant has filed a counterclaim ‘‘shall not impair the right
         of the defendant to prosecute such counterclaim as
         fully as if said action had not been withdrawn . . . .’’
         Therefore, when a defendant has a pending counter-
         claim at the time of the plaintiff’s withdrawal, that coun-
         terclaim survives the withdrawal as a matter of law,
         and if that counterclaim is wrongly stricken from the
         docket along with the plaintiff’s action, the court has
         the authority to restore the case to the docket to permit
         the defendant to prosecute that counterclaim. See Sov-
         ereign Bank v. Harrison, 184 Conn. App. 436, 443, 194
         A.3d 1284 (2018). A counterclaim ‘‘is a cause of action
         . . . on which the defendant might have secured affir-
         mative relief had he sued the plaintiff in a separate
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