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*********************************************** 
WAYNE MARGARUM, SR. v. DONUT

DELIGHT, INC., ET AL.

(AC 43696)

Prescott, Cradle and DiPentima, Js.

Syllabus

The plaintiff, a business invitee of the defendants, sought to recover damages

for personal injuries he sustained when he allegedly slipped and fell on

an accumulation of ice on a sidewalk or parking area maintained and

controlled by the defendants. The plaintiff thereafter withdrew his complaint as against the named defendant. Following a jury verdict and

judgment in favor of the defendant S Co., the plaintiff appealed to this

court. Held that the record was inadequate to review the plaintiff’s claim

that the trial court erred in denying his motion to set aside the verdict,

the plaintiff having failed to order or otherwise provide this court with

transcripts of the evidentiary portion of the trial proceedings in accordance with the applicable rules of practice (§§ 61-10 (a) and 63-8 (a));

moreover, this court declined to review the plaintiff’s inadequately

briefed claim that the court erred in denying his request for supplemental

jury interrogatories and deemed the claim abandoned.

Argued October 21, 2021—officially released February 8, 2022

Procedural History

Action to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by the plaintiff as a result of the defendants’

alleged negligence, brought to the Superior Court in

the judicial district of Stamford-Norwalk, where the

action was withdrawn as against the named defendant;

thereafter, the matter was tried to the jury before Krumeich, J.; subsequently, the court denied the plaintiff’s

motion to submit supplemental or amended jury interrogatories; verdict for the defendant Square Acre

Realty, LLC; thereafter, the court denied the plaintiff’s

motion to set aside the verdict and rendered judgment

in accordance with the verdict, from which the plaintiff

appealed to this court; subsequently, Arlene S. Margarum, executrix of the estate of Wayne Margarum, Sr.,

was substituted as the plaintiff. Affirmed.

Bruce J. Corrigan, Jr., for the appellant (substitute

plaintiff).

Laura Pascale Zaino, with whom was Jennifer L.

Booker, for the appellee (defendant Square Acre

Realty, LLC).
Opinion

PER CURIAM. The original plaintiff, Wayne Margarum, Sr.,1 who claimed that he fell and injured himself

on an icy sidewalk while exiting a donut shop operated

by Donut Delight, Inc. (Donut Delight), at premises

owned by the defendant Square Acre Realty, LLC

(Square Acre), appeals from the judgment of the trial

court, rendered following a jury trial, in favor of the

defendant.2 The plaintiff claims that the court improperly (1) denied a motion to set aside the verdict returned

by the jury because the verdict ‘‘shocks the conscience’’

and is ‘‘manifestly unjust and palpably against the evidence,’’ and (2) denied a motion to submit supplemental

or amended interrogatories to the jury after the jury

initially reported that it was ‘‘deadlocked’’ in its attempt

to answer jury interrogatories and was unable to reach

a verdict. In addition to responding to the plaintiff’s

claims on their merits, the defendant argues that the

plaintiff’s failure to provide this court with the transcripts from the evidentiary portion of the trial precludes this court from reviewing the court’s ruling on

the motion to set aside the verdict and that the second

claim is inadequately briefed. We agree with the defendant that the record is inadequate to review the plaintiff’s first claim and that the plaintiff has inadequately

briefed her claim regarding supplemental jury interrogatories. Accordingly, we decline to review the plaintiff’s

claims and affirm the judgment of the court.

The gravamen of the plaintiff’s first claim is that the

jury’s factual finding, as reflected in its response to

jury interrogatories, that the sidewalk in front of Donut

Delight was not in a defective and unreasonably dangerous condition to business invitees such as the original

plaintiff, was ‘‘palpably against the evidence’’ presented

at trial and, thus, the court should have granted the

original plaintiff’s motion to set aside the jury’s verdict.

In order to properly address that claim, however, it is

necessary to review all of the evidence, including relevant witness testimony, presented to the jury. See Gagliano v. Advanced Specialty Care, P.C., 329 Conn. 745,

754, 189 A.3d 587 (2018) (appellate review of evidentiary

soundness of jury verdict requires court to consider

totality of evidence presented);Rice v. Housing Authority, 129 Conn. App. 614, 619, 20 A.3d 1270 (2011) (this

court stated in appeal from denial of motion to set aside

verdict that ‘‘we are unable to determine the merits of

the plaintiff’s claim without the benefit of the transcripts of the proceedings, there being no way in their

absence for us to examine fully the evidence that was

before the jury in this case’’).

The plaintiff failed to order or otherwise provide this

court with transcripts of the evidentiary portion of the

trial proceedings, thus rendering impossible any meaningful evaluation of the entirety of the evidence presented to the jury. The only transcripts provided by the
plaintiff were of proceedings that occurred after the

matter was submitted to the jury for deliberation, in

which the court addressed questions posed by the jury

and the original plaintiff’s motion to submit supplemental or amended jury interrogatories. Practice Book § 61-

10 (a) provides: ‘‘It is the responsibility of the appellant

to provide an adequate record for review. The appellant

shall determine whether the entire record is complete,

correct and otherwise perfected for presentation on

appeal.’’ Practice Book § 63-8 (a) provides in relevant

part that ‘‘the appellant shall . . . order . . . from an

official court reporter a transcript of the parts of the

proceedings not already on file [that] the appellant

deems necessary for the proper presentation of the

appeal. . . .’’ As we have repeatedly stated, ‘‘[o]ur role

is not to guess at possibilities, but to review claims

based on a complete factual record . . . . If an appellant fails to provide an adequate record, this court may

decline to review the appellant’s claim.’’ (Citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Berger v. Deutermann, 197 Conn. App. 421, 427, 231 A.3d 1281, cert.

denied, 335 Conn. 956, 239 A.3d 318 (2020). On the basis

of the record before us, we simply have no way to

assess whether, as the plaintiff claims, the jury’s verdict

was ‘‘palpably against the evidence.’’ Because the plaintiff failed to meet her burden of providing us with an

adequate record for review, we do not consider the

plaintiff’s first claim.

We also decline to review the plaintiff’s second claim

regarding the court’s denial of the original plaintiff’s

request for supplemental jury interrogatories because

that claim is inadequately briefed. ‘‘We consistently

have held that [a]nalysis, rather than mere abstract

assertion, is required in order to avoid abandoning an

issue by failure to brief the issue properly. . . . [F]or

this court judiciously and efficiently to consider claims

of error raised on appeal . . . the parties must clearly

and fully set forth their arguments in their briefs. We

do not reverse the judgment of a trial court on the basis

of challenges to its rulings that have not been adequately

briefed. . . . The parties may not merely cite a legal

principle without analyzing the relationship between

the facts of the case and the law cited. . . . It is not

enough merely to mention a possible argument in the

most skeletal way, leaving the court to do counsel’s

work, create the ossature for the argument, and put

flesh on its bones.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.)

Bisson v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 184 Conn. App. 619,

642, 195 A.3d 707 (2018). The scant seven sentences

devoted to this claim in the plaintiff’s brief are devoid

of any cogent analysis and contain no discussion or

citation to any relevant legal authority. Accordingly, we

deem the plaintiff’s second claim abandoned.

The judgment is affirmed.

1 During the pendency of the appeal, the original plaintiff died. The appeal

was stayed pursuant to General Statutes § 52-599 until the executrix of
the plaintiff’s estate, Arlene S. Margarum, was substituted for the original

plaintiff. We refer to substitute plaintiff herein as the plaintiff and to Wayne

Margarum, Sr., as the original plaintiff.

2 Donut Delight originally was also a named defendant in the underlying

action, but it entered into a settlement agreement with the original plaintiff

prior to trial, and he withdrew the complaint against it. Square Acre filed

a third-party complaint for indemnification against Alert Security Plus, LLC

(Alert Security), the company that allegedly provided snow removal services

at the subject premises, and Alert Security filed counterclaims against Donut

Delight and Square Acre. Prior to trial, however, Square Acre withdrew its

third-party complaint, and Alert Security withdrew its counterclaims. Thus,

all references to the defendant in this opinion are to Square Acre only.