*********************************************** The “officially released” date that appears near the be- ginning of each opinion is the date the opinion will be pub- lished in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it was released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the be- ginning of all time periods for filing postopinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecticut Reports and Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the latest version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying the opinion as it appears in the Connecticut Law Journal and bound volumes of official reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced and distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publica- tions, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. *********************************************** ALLSTATE INSURANCE COMPANY v. DONTE TENN ET AL. (SC 20586) Robinson, C. J., and McDonald, D’Auria, Mullins, Kahn, Ecker, and Keller, Js. Syllabus The plaintiff insurance company brought the present declaratory judgment action in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, seeking a determination that it was not obligated to defend and indemnify the defendant T in connection with a civil action brought against T by the defendant M. M’s civil action stemmed from an incident in which he sustained injuries after T assaulted him. After the incident, T entered a plea of nolo contendere in a separate criminal prosecution to the charge of first degree assault. The plaintiff filed a motion for summary judgment in the present action, claiming that T’s plea of nolo contendere relieved it of its duty to defend and indemnify T in M’s civil action under a homeowners insurance policy issued by the plaintiff to T’s mother in light of a criminal acts exclusion in that policy. Thereafter, the District Court, pursuant to statute (§ 51-199b (d)) and the rules of practice (§ 82-1), certified to this court the question of whether a plea of nolo contendere could be used by an insurance company in a declaratory judgment action to trigger a criminal acts exclusion to coverage. Held that T’s plea of nolo contendere was inadmissible in the plaintiff’s declar- atory judgment action to prove the occurrence of a criminal act and, therefore, could not be used to trigger the criminal acts exclusion of the homeowners insurance policy: under this state’s common law, as codified in the Connecticut Code of Evidence (§ 4-8A (a) (2)), a plea of nolo contendere generally cannot be admitted in a subsequent proceed- ing to prove the occurrence of criminal act, and the court’s holding in this case was harmonious with case law from numerous jurisdictions; moreover, the purpose of …
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Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals