By Logan Carducci
Appellate lawyers know the feeling of dread all too well. After a thorough review of the record and the appealable issues, a harsh reality emerges: the abuse of discretion standard applies.
This standard most often applies when the appellate courts examine evidentiary rulings, discretionary rulings on a procedural issue, or financial awards in dissolution actions. See, e.g., State v. Apodaca, 303 Conn. 378 (2012); Ill v. Manzo-Ill, 166 Conn. App. 809 (2016); Horey v. Horey, 172 Conn. App. 735 (2017). Under this standard, the appellate courts give every reasonable presumption in favor of upholding the trial court’s decision. See Bobbin v. Sail the Sounds, LLC, 153 Conn. App. 716, 726-27 (2014), cert. denied, 315 Conn. 918 (2015).
When faced with such a deferential standard, attorneys often fear that the scale is tipped too far in the trial judge’s favor and securing a victory is all but impossible. What these lawyers often forget, however, is that a trial judge’s discretion is not unbridled: A court must exercise it “in conformity with the spirit of the law and should not impede or defeat the ends of substantial justice.” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Przekopski v. Zoning Board of Appeals, 131 Conn. App. 178, 192-93, cert. denied, 302 Conn. 946 (2011).
Consistent with these principles, our appellate courts have found an abuse of discretion where, for example, the trial court could have chosen different alternatives but “has decided the matter so arbitrarily as to vitiate logic or has decided it based on improper or irrelevant factors.” State v. Williams, 146 Conn. App. 114, 138 (2013), aff’d, 317 Conn. 691 (2015). More recently, in Fleischer v. Fleischer, 192 Conn. App. 540 (2019) (successfully argued by the author), our Appellate Court held that it was an abuse of discretion for the trial court to dismiss an action for failure to prosecute with due diligence when lesser sanctions were available to the court.
So, the next time you’re faced with the abuse of discretion standard, just remember: deference to the court does not equal defeat for your appeal.