Wooding v. Hartford

The plaintiff, whose prior employment as a police officer with the defendant city of Hartford had been terminated, sought to recover damages from the city for, inter alia, its failure to rehire him as a police officer because of his disability, narcolepsy. The city had posted a job listing seeking applications from nonresidents of Hartford for a police officer position. Applicants were required to apply online and to include with their appli- cations a ''CHIP'' card signifying that they had successfully completed certain physical ability tests required of police officer candidates. The plaintiff, who was not a resident of Hartford, was among fifty-two appli- cants who did not submit a CHIP card with their applications and, thus, was determined by the city to be unqualified for the police officer position. In a two count complaint alleging violations of a provision (§ 46a-60) of the Connecticut Fair Employment Practices Act (§ 46a-51 et seq.), the plaintiff claimed that the city had discriminated against him on the basis of his disability and retaliated against him for having previously brought a lawsuit against the city in connection with the termination of his prior employment as a police officer. The city, which was aware at the time the plaintiff applied for the police officer position that he had been diagnosed with narcolepsy, moved for summary judg- ment, asserting that no genuine issue of material fact existed as to both counts of the plaintiff's complaint and that it was therefore entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The court granted the city's motion, conclud- ing that there was no genuine issue of material fact that the plaintiff had failed to establish a prima facie case of either disability discrimination or retaliation and that, even if he had established a prima facie case as to those claims, summary judgment was warranted on both counts because the city had articulated a legitimate, nondiscriminatory and nonretaliatory reason for its decision not

The plaintiffs, retired city firefighters, filed a motion for contempt alleging that the defendant city had violated a judgment of the trial court incorpo- rating a settlement agreement in which the defendant had agreed to provide a health benefits package administered by A Co., and that the package would not change without the plaintiffs' written consent or a legislative mandate. The defendant thereafter replaced the plan adminis- tered by A Co. with a health insurance plan administered by C Co. and a prescription drug plan administered by V Co. The plaintiffs claimed that, by making this change, the defendant had diminished the health insurance benefits to which they were entitled pursuant to a collective bargaining agreement. Following a hearing on the contempt motion, the trial court concluded that the agreement was clear and unambiguous and that the defendant violated the judgment by changing the plaintiffs' health insurance plan administrators without their written consent. The court, however, denied the motion for contempt because all of the claims submitted by the plaintiffs under the C Co. plan were paid in a manner identical to the A Co. plan and, therefore, the court concluded that the defendant had not wilfully violated the judgment. On the plaintiffs' appeal and the defendant's cross appeal to this court, held that the trial court properly denied the plaintiff's motion for contempt: this court concluded that the trial court incorrectly determined that the defendant violated the agreement by changing the third-party administrators because the reference to the A Co. plan in the agreement was used to establish the health-care benefits to which the plaintiffs were entitled, the agreement did not state that a specific third party must administer those benefits in perpetuity, the defendant's agreement that it would not change or diminish the benefits that comprised the entire health- care package did not extend to the question of which entity would operate as