Opinion ID: 6356584
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Requests Forty-Four and Thirty-Six

Text: We begin our analysis of the defendant's claims with respect to requests forty-four and thirty-six by noting that [w]e are not required to review issues that have been improperly presented to this court through an inadequate brief.... Analysis, rather than mere abstract assertion, is required in order to avoid abandoning an issue by failure to brief the issue properly.... Where a claim is asserted in the statement of issues but thereafter receives only cursory attention in the brief without substantive discussion or citation of authorities, it is deemed to be abandoned. (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Connecticut Light & Power Co. v. Gilmore , 289 Conn. 88 , 124, 956 A.2d 1145 (2008). Moreover, without adequate briefing on the harmfulness of an alleged error, the defendant is not entitled to review of [the] claim on the merits.   Saint Bernard School of Montville, Inc. v. Bank of America , 312 Conn. 811 , 829, 95 A.3d 1063 (2014). Specifically, with respect to jury instructions, we have explained that [i]t is axiomatic ... that not every error is harmful.... [W]e have often stated that before a party is entitled to a new trial ... he or she has the burden of demonstrating that the error was harmful.... An instructional impropriety is harmful if it is likely that it affected the verdict. (Citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Scanlon v. Connecticut Light & Power Co. , 258 Conn. 436 , 448, 782 A.2d 87 (2001). As the party challenging the jury instructions, the defendant was required to prove that the instructions likely affected the verdict. With respect to request forty-four, the defendant's harm analysis consists of only one sentence in which he claims that, had the trial court given his requested instruction, he would have been entitled to judgment as a matter of law on the [f]ourth [c]ount of the amended complaint .... As to request thirty-six, the defendant's harm analysis is similarly brief and asserts that the trial court's charge permitted the plaintiff to recover in derogation of the protections afforded by the [a]ct and misled the jury and caused injustice to him. Thus, the defendant's harm analyses consist of only cursory statements. In the absence of additional detail regarding the question of harm, we conclude that these claims of instructional error were inadequately briefed. 13