The justices will also hear a case questioning whether superior court judges can issue summary judgment decisions in probate matters and a felony murder defendant's claim that a judge violated his due process rights by holding him in criminal contempt for a profanity-laden tirade.
Here are four of the biggest cases on tap during the high state court's fifth term of the 2024-2025 calendar year, which runs March 3 through March 14.
Aquarion Water Battles Regulator for Revenue
Aquarion Water Co. has accused the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority of issuing a "logically incoherent decision" that refused to increase the company's base revenues for infrastructure projects after August 2022 while agreeing hikes were necessary to offset similar projects ahead of that date.
According to its brief, the Eversource subsidiary filed a 2022 request to recoup $700 million in infrastructure investments since its last rate hike bid in 2013 and to offset $42 million in future improvements. The hikes also sought to offset inflation, Aquarion wrote. The increase would have added about $5 to the average homeowner's monthly bill, the company suggested.
Rather than allow the company to charge more for projects after August 2022, PURA cut Aquarion's base revenues by $2 million, the brief said.
Aquarion argues PURA's decision threatens its financial integrity and appears to have been punitive.
"Here, PURA approved recovery for Aquarion's plant additions through August of 2022, but denied recovery for $42 million in plant additions placed in service after this arbitrary date cut-off — even though the evidence as to both categories was materially identical," it wrote.
The company said PURA's decision was "at war with itself" and "riddled with legal error."
According to PURA, Aquarion ignored a 2010 directive to keep a lid on consumer costs and instead embarked on a spending spree.
"PURA nevertheless let the company recover 93% of its capital costs, and left the door open for Aquarion to recover the remainder in a future rate case if it could better justify the costs," the agency's brief argued.
PURA claims the company offered weak justifications for its expenses.
Aquarion earned an 8.7% return on equity, "well within the range of similar utilities," according to PURA.
In a separate brief, the Office of Consumer Counsel urged the justices to uphold PURA's findings.
"Contrary to Aquarion's dire characterizations of the present case, in reality it amounts to nothing more than another attempt by Aquarion to relitigate its rate case before a judicial tribunal on those points where it failed to carry its evidentiary burden and persuade PURA to grant recovery of those revenues it did not," it wrote.
Aquarion lost an appeal to a trial court judge. The supreme court took the case before intermediate review under a state statute that allows the justices to directly take any case pending in the Appellate Court.
Argument is scheduled for March 7.
The case is Aquarion Water Co. of Connecticut v. Public Utilities Regulatory Authority, case number SC 21010.
Estate War Raises Appeal Procedure Query
Two co-trustees warring over a couple's estate have asked the justices whether superior court judges are permitted to issue summary judgment decisions when hearing probate court appeals.
According to co-trustee Jeffrey A. Rutherford, the answer is no, because probate processes are strictly defined by Connecticut statutes that do not contain summary judgment mechanisms.
"Probate appeals before the superior court are not ordinary civil actions, but rather, creatures of statute, heard by the superior court sitting as a court of probate with no greater powers than those of that court," his brief argues. Rutherford said his case presents an opportunity for the supreme court to clarify a split of lower court authority. He describes the issue as one of first impression.
Attorney Richard J. Slagle, the co-trustee on the opposite side of the case, has urged the justices to keep intact a superior court judge's summary judgment decision in his favor.
His brief argues that probate appeals to the superior court can be decided under the Connecticut Practice Book's summary judgment provisions.
"Summary judgment is merely a procedure that serves judicial efficiency by allowing the court to enter judgment as a matter of law without the need for a trial, where no genuine issues of fact exist," Slagle's brief says.
The case surrounds the estate of William A. Rutherford, Jeffrey's father, and his wife Joyce A. Rutherford.
The argument is scheduled for March 6.
The case is Rutherford v. Slagle, case number SC 21066.
Murder Convict Fights Contempt Over Verbal Attacks
The justices on March 5 will consider whether a trial court judge was correct to hold a man in criminal contempt for what the state's attorney's office called "persistent breaches of decorum, racially charged insults, and raucousness" targeting a judge during a habeas corpus hearing.
According to prosecutors, Superior Court Judge John M. Newson was within his power to add three consecutive criminal contempt sentences of six months each to Gregory Johnson's 55-year prison term after a series of expletives and racial insults aimed at the judge, who is Black.
Johnson claims he did not commit criminal contempt and argues Judge Newson should have deferred the matter to another judge.
According to state prison records, Johnson, 59, was convicted of felony murder and originally sentenced in 1998. He is eligible for release in 2054, when he is 89.
The argument will be held March 5.
The case is Johnson v. Superior Court, case number SC 21074.
Ex-Justice Backs Convict Claiming Coerced Confession
Another criminal case requires the state's high court to weigh legal arguments by a former member of its own bench. Associate Justice Joette Katz left court in 2011 to lead the Connecticut Department of Children and Families, and she is now in private practice at Shipman & Goodwin LLP.
Her name appears on James Maharg's brief requesting his murder conviction be overturned based on what he calls a coerced confession. He accuses interrogators of ignoring his requests to remain silent and for medical treatment before "wringing what passed for a confession from him before he collapsed in a seizure," according to his supreme court brief.
Shipman & Goodwin's Eric Del Pozo, who signed the brief, will handle oral arguments.
The state urged the justices to uphold the conviction based on 911 calls and crime scene forensic evidence.
The argument is scheduled for March 10.
The case is State of Connecticut v. Maharg, case number SC 20855.
--Editing by Adam LoBelia.
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