Cohen v. Statewide Grievance Committee

The plaintiff attorney appealed to this court from the judgment of the trial court dismissing, for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, his appeal from the decision of the defendant Statewide Grievance Committee, which had denied his request to vacate a prior decision by a reviewing commit- tee of the defendant that imposed a disciplinary sanction against him. The plaintiff, who had represented L in a real estate transaction, intro- duced L to one of the plaintiff's then law partners, O, who was looking to secure a loan for the law firm. In 2001, L loaned the plaintiff's law firm $70,000, and, by 2008, when the law firm had not repaid the loan, the plaintiff and O each executed new notes for repayment of the loan by 2013. In 2011, L filed a grievance complaint against the plaintiff. The reviewing committee concluded in its 2013 decision that the plaintiff violated rule 1.8 (a) of the Rules of Professional Conduct by failing to advise L that he should seek the advice of independent counsel in connection with the loan, and by failing to advise L in writing that he was not acting as his lawyer in connection with the loan and to establish in writing the precise nature of the plaintiff's role in the transaction. The reviewing committee ordered the plaintiff to attend a continuing education course in legal ethics. The defendant thereafter denied the plaintiff's request for review, in which he stated that he accepted the discipline that was imposed and waived any appeal to the Superior Court. Four years later, the defendant declined to act on a motion that the plaintiff filed in 2017, pursuant to Disciplinary Counsel v. Elder (325 Conn. 378), in which he sought to vacate the disciplinary sanction on the ground that the six year time period in the applicable rule of practice (§ 2-32 (a) (2) (E)) for filing a grievance mandated the dismissal of L's grievance. The defendant also declined to act on the plaintiff's subsequent motion for reconsideration. In granting the defendan

The plaintiff, a candidate for town council in the November, 2025 South Windsor municipal election, appealed from the trial court's judgment dis- missing his action brought pursuant to the statutes (§§ 9-328 and 9-371b) affording a candidate who is aggrieved by any ruling of any election official in connection with a municipal election or referendum, respectively, expe- dited judicial review of his or her claims. In the November, 2025 municipal election, South Windsor electors approved, by way of referendum, several revisions to the South Windsor charter, one of which changed the maxi- mum number of individuals affiliated with a particular political party who could serve on the nine member town council from six individuals to a bare majority of five. During that election, electors also voted for town council candidates, with six Democratic Party candidates receiving more votes than any Republican Party candidate. The plaintiff received the sixth highest vote total of the Democratic candidates, and B received the fourth highest vote total of the Republican candidates. Following the election, the defendant, the South Windsor town clerk, determined that the bare majority charter revision, as approved in the referendum, applied to the 2025 town council election, even though the minutes from a meeting of the South Windsor Charter Revision Commission at which the commission proposed the bare majority charter revision indicated that the revision, if approved, would not take effect until the November, 2027 South Windsor municipal election. The town clerk thereupon issued a preliminary list of election winners, declaring that B, rather than the plaintiff, had won the final seat on the town council. The plaintiff claimed in the trial court that he was aggrieved by the town clerk's decision to apply the bare majority charter revision in determining which candidates had won the November, 2025 town council election. The trial court rendered judgment dismissing the plaintiff's ac