Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

ELM CITY LOCAL, CACP v. CITY
OF NEW HAVEN
(AC 47260)
Bright, C. J., and Moll and Clark, Js.

Syllabus

The plaintiff union appealed from the judgment of the Superior Court denying
its application to vacate an arbitration award in favor of the defendant city.
The plaintiff claimed that the court improperly concluded that the arbitration
panel did not exceed its powers when it determined that the defendant had
just cause to terminate the employment of one of the plaintiff’s members,
an officer with the defendant’s police department. Held:

The trial court properly concluded that the arbitration award conformed to
the parties’ submission to the arbitration panel, the arbitration panel having
decided an issue that the parties had given it the authority to decide.

This court declined to review the plaintiff’s claim that the trial court improp-
erly refused to vacate the award because the arbitration panel’s reliance on
a certain expert opinion constituted a manifest disregard of the law, as the
plaintiff abandoned that claim in the Superior Court and failed to adequately
brief it before this court.
Argued January 7—officially released February 25, 2025

Procedural History

Application to vacate an arbitration award, brought
to the Superior Court in the judicial district of New
Haven and tried to the court, Stewart, J.; judgment
denying the application, from which the plaintiff
appealed to this court. Affirmed.
Alexander T. Taubes, for the appellant (plaintiff).
Floyd J. Dugas, with whom was Rebecca Goldberg,
for the appellee (defendant).
Opinion

CLARK, J. The plaintiff union, Elm City Local, CACP,
appeals from the judgment of the Superior Court deny-
ing its application to vacate an arbitration award (appli-
cation) in favor of the defendant, the city of New Haven.
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

On appeal, the plaintiff claims that the court improperly
concluded that the arbitration panel did not exceed its
powers when it determined that the defendant had just
cause to terminate the employment of Jason Santiago,
one of the plaintiff’s members, with the New Haven
Police Department (department). In particular, the
plaintiff claims that the court should have vacated the
arbitration award because (1) the award failed to con-
form to the parties’ submission, and (2) the arbitration
panel manifestly disregarded the law. We affirm the
judgment of the court.
The following facts, as found by the arbitration panel
or as are otherwise undisputed in the record,1 and pro-
cedural history are relevant to this appeal. On Decem-
ber 25, 2019, Santiago, who was then an officer with
the department, was called to the scene of a disabled
vehicle on Lombard Street in New Haven. When he
arrived, accompanied by two fellow officers, Santiago
encountered Officer Michael Hinton, who was also an
employee of the department, Luis Rivera, and Julie
Cruz. Rivera and Cruz were arguing, and one of Santi-
ago’s fellow officers escorted Cruz away from Rivera.
Rivera said: ‘‘Don’t touch her, don’t fucking touch her.’’
Santiago told Rivera to relax, and Rivera responded:
‘‘You relax.’’ Santiago said that he had ‘‘had enough
of this guy,’’ turned Rivera around, and attempted to
handcuff him. Rivera began to resist, and a brief struggle
ensued during which Santiago twisted Rivera’s leg in a
‘‘pain compliance technique.’’ Eventually, Rivera was
handcuffed. Santiago then kicked Rivera in the groin
while he lay handcuffed on his stomach.
After he kicked Rivera, Santiago, assisted by Hinton,
lifted Rivera up by his left ponytail. As soon as Rivera
1
On January 12, 2024, the plaintiff filed a certificate with this court pursu-
ant to Practice Book § 63-4 (a) (3), stating that no transcripts were necessary
for this appeal. Any transcripts of the arbitration hearings and of proceedings
in the Superior Court are thus not part of the record on appeal.
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

got to his feet, the officers’ body worn camera footage
recorded a sound that resembled spitting. Santiago then
punched Rivera in the face, and Rivera fell to the
ground. Hinton said: ‘‘Bro why you spit.’’ Santiago
pointed his finger in the area of Rivera’s left ear and
said: ‘‘That’s assault second on a police officer.’’ Rivera
directed a series of expletives at the officers and spat
blood on the road. At some point, a woman named
Jessica Morales arrived at the scene, and Santiago asked
her if she was Rivera’s wife, to which she answered
that she was. Santiago then asked who Cruz was, and
said: ‘‘Who are you to him . . . you’re the side
chick, huh?’’

Rivera was arrested, and Assistant State’s Attorney
Jennifer Lindade was assigned to prosecute the case.
After Lindade reviewed footage of the incident, she
wrote to the department’s internal affairs division to
express ‘‘serious concerns about the force used against
[Rivera].’’ The department then opened an internal
affairs investigation, which was conducted by Detective
Jessica Stone and Sergeant Christopher Fennessey.

In the course of the investigation, Stone interviewed
Officer David Acosta, a use of force trainer with the
department. Acosta reviewed video footage of the inci-
dent and told Stone that, in his view, Santiago’s kick
to Rivera’s groin, as well as his decision to pull Rivera
by his hair, violated the department’s use of force policy.
He further concluded that Santiago had been justified
in punching Rivera in the face. Stone and Fennessey
ultimately found, in line with Acosta’s conclusions, that
Santiago had acted unreasonably when he kicked
Rivera in the groin and pulled his hair, but that he had
acted reasonably when he punched Rivera in the face.
They accordingly concluded that Santiago had violated
department policy.
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Chief Otoniel Reyes then ordered a Loudermill hear-
ing.2 At the hearing, Santiago did not take responsibility
or express remorse for his actions, which caused Reyes
concern that he might engage in such conduct again.
Reyes recommended to the New Haven Police Commis-
sion that Santiago be terminated from his employment,3
and Santiago was subsequently discharged.
Santiago then filed a grievance pursuant to the collec-
tive bargaining agreement between the plaintiff and the
defendant, which provided that officers shall not be
terminated except for ‘‘just cause.’’ After exhausting
preliminary steps with the department and the defen-
dant, the plaintiff filed a request for mediation and arbi-
tration with the State Board of Mediation and Arbitra-
tion (board) in the Connecticut Department of Labor.
Five remote hearings were held before a three member
panel of the board between November, 2020, and Febru-
ary, 2021. The parties’ joint submission to the arbitration
panel stated: ‘‘1. Did the [defendant] have just cause to
terminate [Santiago]? 2. If not, what shall the remedy
be?’’
Several witnesses, including Acosta, testified before
the arbitration panel. In the period between his inter-
view with Stone and his testimony before the arbitration
panel, Acosta had been disciplined by Reyes. Acosta’s
subsequent testimony to the arbitration panel differed
markedly from the conclusions he had provided to
Stone during the department’s internal affairs investiga-
tion. Before the arbitration panel, Acosta testified that
2
‘‘ ‘[A] tenured public employee is entitled to oral or written notice of
the charges against him, an explanation of the employer’s evidence, and an
opportunity to present his side of the story’ before termination. Board of
Education v. Loudermill, [470 U.S. 532, 546, 105 S. Ct. 1487, 84 L. Ed. 2d
494 (1985)]. The opportunity to present one’s ‘side of the story’ is generally
referred to as a Loudermill hearing.’’ AFSCME, Council 4, Local 2663 v.
Dept. of Children & Families, 317 Conn. 238, 243 n.3, 117 A.3d 470 (2015).
3
In New Haven, the New Haven Police Commission has the authority to
terminate officers; the police chief does not.
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Santiago’s decision to pull Rivera’s hair might be justi-
fied if Santiago was not actually bearing or pulling Rive-
ra’s weight. He further testified that he did not have an
opinion on whether Santiago was justified in kicking
Rivera in the groin because he would need to know
more about Santiago’s state of mind and how he had
perceived the totality of the circumstances.
Following Acosta’s testimony, the defendant hired
Eric Daigle, an attorney and former state trooper, to
review the matter. After reviewing the video footage of
the incident and other exhibits, Daigle prepared a
report, which was submitted to the arbitration panel,
opining in relevant part that the kick to Rivera’s groin,
hair pulling, punch, and reference to Cruz as a ‘‘side
chick’’ all violated department policies. Daigle was per-
mitted to testify before the arbitration panel over the
plaintiff’s objection. On June 24, 2021, the arbitration
panel issued an award in favor of the defendant, finding
that ‘‘[t]he [defendant] had just cause to terminate [San-
tiago].’’
On July 22, 2021, the plaintiff filed its application in
the Superior Court, seeking to vacate the arbitration
award pursuant to General Statutes § 52-418.4 In its
application, the plaintiff claimed in relevant part5 that
4
General Statutes § 52-418 provides in relevant part: ‘‘(a) Upon the applica-
tion of any party to an arbitration, the superior court for the judicial district
in which one of the parties resides . . . or, when the court is not in session,
any judge thereof, shall make an order vacating the award if it finds any of
the following defects: (1) If the award has been procured by corruption,
fraud or undue means; (2) if there has been evident partiality or corruption
on the part of any arbitrator; (3) if the arbitrators have been guilty of
misconduct in refusing to postpone the hearing upon sufficient cause shown
or in refusing to hear evidence pertinent and material to the controversy
or of any other action by which the rights of any party have been prejudiced;
or (4) if the arbitrators have exceeded their powers or so imperfectly exe-
cuted them that a mutual, final and definite award upon the subject matter
submitted was not made. . . .’’
5
The plaintiff also claimed that vacatur of the award was warranted under
§ 52-418 (a) (2), evident partiality or corruption on the part of any arbitrator,
because a member of the arbitration panel had not disclosed that he was
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vacatur of the award was warranted under § 52-418 (a)
(4) because the arbitrators had exceeded their powers
by relying on impermissible ‘‘after-acquired evidence,’’
namely, Daigle’s opinion that Santiago’s actions had
violated department policies. The plaintiff further
claimed that the arbitration panel had ‘‘exceeded its
authority under the issue submission’’ and acted with
‘‘manifest disregard of the law.’’ The parties filed briefs,
and the plaintiff, in its brief, did not iterate its claim
that the arbitration panel had manifestly disregarded
the law.
On December 18, 2023, the court, Stewart, J., denied
the plaintiff’s application. In its memorandum of deci-
sion, the court explained that a party can prevail on a
claim under § 52-418 (a) (4) that an arbitration panel
exceeded its powers by establishing that either (1) the
arbitration award fails to conform to the parties’ sub-
mission, or (2) the arbitration panel manifestly disre-
garded the law. See, e.g., Blondeau v. Baltierra, 337
Conn. 127, 155, 252 A.3d 317 (2020). The court con-
cluded that the plaintiff had abandoned any claim per-
taining to the arbitration panel’s alleged manifest disre-
gard of the law because, although the plaintiff had
invoked that ground for vacatur in its application, it
had failed to brief it. The court further concluded that
the arbitration award conformed to the parties’ submis-
sion, because the submission asked, ‘‘[d]id the [defen-
dant] have just cause to terminate [Santiago],’’ and the
award stated that ‘‘[t]he [defendant] had just cause to
terminate [Santiago].’’ Having concluded that the award
conformed to the submission, the court declined to
related by marriage to a legislative cosponsor of Connecticut’s ‘‘Police
Accountability Bill,’’ by which we assume the plaintiff meant No. 20-1 of
the 2020 Public Acts, titled ‘‘An Act Concerning Police Accountability,’’
which the legislature passed during a special session in July, 2020. The court
concluded that the plaintiff had failed to adduce sufficient evidence to
support a claim of evident partiality, and the plaintiff does not challenge
that conclusion on appeal.
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review whether it was proper for the arbitration panel
to rely on Daigle’s expert opinion, reasoning that to
conduct such an inquiry would be to ‘‘undertak[e] a de
novo review that is not permitted.’’ This appeal fol-
lowed.
We begin with the relevant legal principles. ‘‘Judicial
review of arbitral decisions is narrowly confined. . . .
[T]he law in this state takes a strongly affirmative view
of consensual arbitration. . . . Arbitration is a favored
method to prevent litigation, promote tranquility, and
expedite the equitable settlement of disputes. . . .
Where the submission does not otherwise state, the
arbitrators are empowered to decide factual and legal
questions and an award cannot be vacated on the
grounds that . . . the interpretation of the agreement
by the arbitrators was erroneous. Courts will not review
the evidence nor, where the submission is unrestricted,
will they review the arbitrators’ decision of the legal
questions involved. . . . In other words, [u]nder an
unrestricted submission, the arbitrators’ decision is
considered final and binding; thus courts will not review
the evidence considered by the arbitrators nor will they
review the award for errors of law or fact.’’ (Citations
omitted; emphasis omitted; internal quotation marks
omitted.) DiTullio v. LM General Ins. Co., 210 Conn.
App. 347, 358–59, 270 A.3d 99 (2022). ‘‘A submission is
unrestricted when . . . the parties’ arbitration agree-
ment contains no language restricting the breadth of
issues, reserving explicit rights, or conditioning the
award on court review.’’ (Internal quotation marks omit-
ted.) Board of Education v. Waterbury Teachers Assn.,
CEA-NEA, 196 Conn. App. 463, 473 n.8, 230 A.3d 746
(2020). In the present case, the court concluded, and
the parties do not dispute, that the submission to the
arbitration panel was unrestricted. See also, e.g., Con-
necticut State Police Union v. Dept. of Public Safety,
86 Conn. App. 686, 690, 862 A.2d 344 (2004) (submission
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that asked ‘‘[w]as the [plaintiff] terminated for just
cause’’ and, ‘‘[i]f not, what shall be the remedy consis-
tent with the [union] [c]ontract’’ was unrestricted (inter-
nal quotation marks omitted)), cert. denied, 274 Conn.
901, 876 A.2d 11 (2005).
‘‘We have, however, recognized certain grounds for
vacating an award even when the parties have commit-
ted a particular question to the authority of an arbitra-
tor, including that: (1) the award rules on the constitu-
tionality of a statute . . . (2) the award violates clear
public policy . . . or (3) the award contravenes one
or more of the statutory proscriptions of § 52-418.’’
(Internal quotation marks omitted.) Ahmed v. Oak Man-
agement Corp., 348 Conn. 152, 176, 302 A.3d 850 (2023),
cert. denied, U.S. , 144 S. Ct. 2520, 219 L. Ed.
2d 1200 (2024). Relevant to this appeal, subdivision (4)
of § 52-418 (a) provides that an arbitration award shall
be vacated ‘‘if the arbitrators have exceeded their pow-
ers or so imperfectly executed them that a mutual, final
and definite award upon the subject matter submitted
was not made.’’ ‘‘[A] claim that the arbitrators have
‘exceeded their powers’ may be established under § 52-
418 in either one of two ways: (1) the award fails to
conform to the submission, or, in other words, falls
outside the scope of the submission; or (2) the arbitra-
tors manifestly disregarded the law.’’ Harty v. Cantor
Fitzgerald & Co., 275 Conn. 72, 85, 881 A.2d 139 (2005).
‘‘The standard for reviewing a claim that the award
does not conform to the submission requires what [our
Supreme Court has] termed in effect, de novo judicial
review. . . . The de novo label in this context means
something very different from typical de novo review
because review under this standard and in this setting
is limited to a comparison of the award to the submis-
sion. Our inquiry generally is limited to a determination
as to whether the parties have vested the arbitrators
with the authority to decide the issue presented or to
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

award the relief conferred.’’ (Internal quotation marks
omitted.) ARVYS Protein, Inc. v. A/F Protein, Inc., 219
Conn. App. 20, 31, 293 A.3d 899, cert. denied, 347 Conn.
905, 297 A.3d 198 (2023).
‘‘In determining whether an arbitrat[ion] [panel] has
exceeded the authority granted under the contract, a
court cannot base the decision on whether the court
would have ordered the same relief, or whether or not
the arbitrator[s] correctly interpreted the contract. The
court must instead focus on whether the [arbitrators]
had authority to reach a certain issue, not whether that
issue was correctly decided. Consequently, as long as
the arbitrator[s] [are] even arguably construing or
applying the contract and acting within the scope of
authority, the award must be enforced. The arbitra-
tor[s’] decision cannot be overturned even if the court
is convinced that the arbitrator[s] committed serious
error. . . . Moreover, [e]very reasonable presumption
and intendment will be made in favor of the award and
of the arbitrator[s’] acts and proceedings. Hence, the
burden rests on the party challenging the award to
produce evidence sufficient to show that it does not
conform to the submission. . . .
‘‘Such a limited scope of judicial review is warranted
given the fact that the parties voluntarily bargained for
the decision of the arbitrator[s] and, as such, the parties
are presumed to have assumed the risks of and waived
objections to that decision. . . . It is clear that a party
cannot object to an award which accomplishes pre-
cisely what the arbitrators were authorized to do merely
because that party dislikes the results.’’ (Citations omit-
ted; footnote omitted; internal quotation marks omit-
ted.) Comprehensive Orthopaedics & Musculoskeletal
Care, LLC v. Axtmayer, 293 Conn. 748, 755–56, 980
A.2d 297 (2009).
With respect to a claim that an arbitration panel mani-
festly disregarded the law, our Supreme Court has
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explained that ‘‘[a]n award that manifests an egregious
or patently irrational application of the law is an award
that should be set aside pursuant to § 52-418 (a) (4)
because the arbitrator[s] ha[ve] exceeded [their] pow-
ers or so imperfectly executed them that a mutual, final
and definite award upon the subject matter submitted
was not made. We emphasize, however, that the mani-
fest disregard of the law ground for vacating an arbitra-
tion award is narrow and should be reserved for circum-
stances of an arbitrator’s extraordinary lack of fidelity
to established legal principles. . . .
‘‘In Garrity [v. McCaskey, 223 Conn. 1, 612 A.2d 742
(1992)], we adopted the test enunciated by the United
States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in inter-
preting the federal equivalent of § 52-418 (a) (4). . . .
The test consists of the following three elements, all
of which must be satisfied in order for a court to vacate
an arbitration award on the ground that the arbitration
panel manifestly disregarded the law: (1) the error was
obvious and capable of being readily and instantly per-
ceived by the average person qualified to serve as an
arbitrator; (2) the arbitration panel appreciated the exis-
tence of a clearly governing legal principle but decided
to ignore it; and (3) the governing law alleged to have
been ignored by the arbitration panel is well defined,
explicit, and clearly applicable.’’ (Internal quotation
marks omitted.) Alexson v. Foss, 276 Conn. 599, 613–14,
887 A.2d 872 (2006). ‘‘This standard of proof has rarely,
if ever, been met in Connecticut.’’ State v. Connecticut
State Employees Assn., SEIU Local 2001, 287 Conn.
258, 280, 947 A.2d 928 (2008).
With these principles in mind, we turn to the plain-
tiff’s claims.
I
The plaintiff first claims that the court improperly
concluded that the arbitration award conformed to the
parties’ submission. We are not persuaded.
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The submission to the arbitration panel asked: ‘‘1.
Did the [defendant] have just cause to terminate [Santi-
ago]? 2. If not, what shall the remedy be?’’ The arbitra-
tion award read: ‘‘The [defendant] had just cause to
terminate [Santiago].’’ Notwithstanding this apparently
clear correspondence between the award and the sub-
mission, the plaintiff nonetheless insists that, because
the submission was written in the past tense—‘‘[d]id
the [defendant] have just cause to terminate [Santi-
ago]’’—the arbitration panel was ‘‘unambiguously’’
barred from considering any evidence that the defen-
dant did not consider at the time it made its termination
decision, including Daigle’s opinion on whether the con-
duct for which Santiago was terminated violated depart-
ment policies. As such, the plaintiff argues, when the
arbitration panel relied in part on Daigle’s opinion in
concluding that the defendant had just cause to termi-
nate Santiago’s employment, it answered the question
of ‘‘whether Santiago’s conduct could theoretically jus-
tify termination based on a new expert’s opinion,’’
rather than the question that, in the plaintiff’s view, the
parties actually posed in their submission, ‘‘whether the
[defendant] had just cause based on the evidence it
actually considered . . . .’’

Of course, the parties’ submission to the arbitration
panel did not ask whether the defendant had just cause
to terminate Santiago’s employment ‘‘based on the evi-
dence it actually considered . . . .’’ It only asked
whether the defendant had just cause to terminate San-
tiago’s employment. The arbitration panel, therefore,
was asked to determine only whether there existed
facts and circumstances constituting ‘‘just cause’’ to
terminate Santiago’s employment under the parties’ col-
lective bargaining agreement. Nothing in the text of
the submission constrained the arbitration panel, in
arriving at its determination, to considering only certain
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expert opinions about the relevant facts and circum-
stances at issue. Had the parties intended to impose
such a constraint on the arbitration panel, they could
have done so clearly and explicitly in their submission,
provided that the collective bargaining agreement per-
mitted it. See, e.g., AFSCME, Council 4, Local 2663 v.
Dept. of Children & Families, 317 Conn. 238, 253, 117
A.3d 470 (2015) (‘‘[h]ad [the parties] intended to limit
the arbitrator’s consideration to specific conduct, spe-
cific evidence, or a specific state of mind, they could
have limited the scope of the submission if the agree-
ment permitted such a limitation’’); Asselin & Vieceli
Partnership, LLC v. Washburn, 194 Conn. App. 519,
530, 221 A.3d 875 (2019) (‘‘it is well established that [i]t
is the province of the parties to set the limits of the
authority of the arbitrators, and the parties will be
bound by the limits they have fixed’’ (internal quotation
marks omitted)), cert. denied, 334 Conn. 913, 221 A.3d
449 (2020).

This court’s holding in Middlebury v. Teamsters
Local Union No. 677, 57 Conn. App. 223, 748 A.2d 340
(2000), is instructive. In Middlebury, this court affirmed
a judgment confirming an arbitration award in favor of
the town of Middlebury, which had discharged the chief
mechanic in the town garage for insubordination and
theft. Id., 224. The parties’ submission to the arbitrators
had asked whether the town had just cause to terminate
the mechanic, and the arbitrators had determined that
the town had just cause to do so. Id., 227. On appeal,
the union argued that the award did not conform to
the submission because the arbitrators had improperly
considered additional evidence of pretermination mis-
conduct that the town had not relied upon to support the
mechanic’s discharge. Id., 225–26. This court disagreed,
concluding that, because the submission was
unrestricted, ‘‘our review is limited to a comparison of
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

the award with the submission . . . .’’ (Citation omit-
ted.) Id., 226–27. This court then compared the language
of the award to that of the submission and concluded
that, because the award conformed to the submission,
the judgment upholding the arbitration award must be
affirmed. Id., 227.
In this case the plaintiff, like the union in Middlebury,
claims that the arbitration award fails to conform to the
submission because the arbitration panel considered
evidence that was not considered by the defendant
when it discharged Santiago. As in Middlebury, the
submission to the arbitration panel in this case was
unrestricted. Thus, in this case, we, like the court in
Middlebury, are limited to comparing the award to the
submission and may not retroactively fashion limits on
the arbitrators’ authority that the parties did not include
in their submission. Indeed, the plaintiff’s claim in this
case is even weaker than that of the union in Mid-
dlebury, because the plaintiff does not contend that the
arbitration panel improperly considered evidence of
additional misconduct, but only that it improperly con-
sidered a new expert opinion about the same underlying
misconduct that the defendant considered when it ter-
minated Santiago’s employment. Because the arbitra-
tion panel concluded that the defendant had just cause
to terminate Santiago’s employment, which directly
answered the first question that the parties had posed
in their submission, it decided an issue that the parties
had given it the authority to decide. See, e.g., Burr Road
Operating Co. II, LLC v. New England Health Care
Employees Union, District 1199, 162 Conn. App. 525,
537 n.4, 131 A.3d 1238 (2016); Connecticut State Police
Union v. Dept. of Public Safety, supra, 86 Conn. App.
690–91. The plaintiff’s claim that the court improperly
concluded that the award conformed to the submission
therefore fails.6
6
The plaintiff’s reliance on our Supreme Court’s decision in AFSCME,
Council 4, Local 1565 v. Dept. of Correction, 298 Conn. 824, 6 A.3d 1142
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

II
The plaintiff also claims that the court improperly
refused to vacate the award because the arbitration
panel’s reliance on Daigle’s expert opinion constituted
a manifest disregard of the law. We decline to review
this claim, both because the plaintiff abandoned it in
the Superior Court and because the plaintiff has failed
to adequately brief it before this court.
‘‘It is well established that an appellate court is under
no obligation to consider a claim that is not distinctly
raised at the trial level. . . . [B]ecause our review is
limited to matters in the record, we [also] will not
address issues not decided by the trial court. . . . The
requirement that [a] claim be raised distinctly means
that it must be so stated as to bring to the attention of
the court the precise matter on which its decision is
being asked. . . . The reason for the rule is obvious:
to permit a party to raise a claim on appeal that has
not been raised at trial—after it is too late for the trial
court . . . to address the claim—would encourage
trial by ambuscade, which is unfair to both the trial
court and the opposing party.’’ (Citations omitted;
emphasis omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.)
Remillard v. Remillard, 297 Conn. 345, 351–52, 999 A.2d
713 (2010).
It is also well established that ‘‘[w]e are not required
to review claims that are inadequately briefed. . . . We
(2010) (AFSCME), to support its argument that the award fails to conform
to the submission is misplaced. In AFSCME, the court held that an arbitrator
violated public policy when she relied upon a discharged correction officer’s
acceptance of accelerated rehabilitation as evidence of the officer’s alleged
misconduct. Id., 827–28. AFSCME, therefore, did not involve a claim that
the arbitrator’s award failed to conform to the submission. Rather, it involved
a challenge to the arbitrator’s decision on public policy grounds—a separate
basis for vacatur that the plaintiff does not assert and that involves the
application of a different legal standard. See, e.g., id., 835–38. AFSCME is
thus inapposite to the plaintiff’s claim.
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16 ,0 0 Conn. App. 1
Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

consistently have held that [a]nalysis, rather than mere
abstract assertion, is required in order to avoid aban-
doning an issue by failure to brief the issue properly.
. . . [F]or this court judiciously and efficiently to con-
sider 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 rela-
tionship between the facts of the case and the law
cited. . . . [A]ssignments of error which are merely
mentioned but not briefed beyond a statement of the
claim will be deemed abandoned and will not be
reviewed by this court.’’ (Internal quotation marks omit-
ted.) Clelford v. Bristol, 150 Conn. App. 229, 233, 90
A.3d 998 (2014).
As we have discussed previously in this opinion, the
court concluded that the plaintiff had abandoned its
manifest disregard claim by failing to brief it. The plain-
tiff does not challenge this conclusion. Indeed, in its
principal appellant’s brief, the plaintiff does not even
acknowledge that the court deemed this claim aban-
doned. In its reply brief, the plaintiff argues for the first
time that, abandonment notwithstanding, we should
review its manifest disregard claim because it involves
‘‘a pure issue of law, on a matter of great public impor-
tance, affecting the right of a police officer to earn and
make a living . . . .’’ Regardless of whether we con-
strue this argument as a request for plain error review
or for the exercise of our supervisory authority over
the administration of justice to review unpreserved
claims, it is unavailing, because neither request may be
made for the first time in a reply brief. See, e.g., Grimm
v. Grimm, 276 Conn. 377, 393–94 n.19, 886 A.2d 391
(2005), cert. denied, 547 U.S. 1148, 126 S. Ct. 2296, 164
L. Ed. 2d 815 (2006); Perry v. State, 94 Conn. App. 733,
740 n.5, 894 A.2d 367, cert. denied, 278 Conn. 915, 899
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Elm City Local, CACP v. New Haven

A.2d 621 (2006). We therefore decline to review the
plaintiff’s claim that the arbitration panel manifestly
disregarded the law because the plaintiff abandoned
this claim in the Superior Court.
Even if we were to overlook the plaintiff’s abandon-
ment of its manifest disregard claim in the Superior
Court, the plaintiff has also abandoned that claim before
this court by virtue of inadequate briefing. Although the
plaintiff’s principal appellate brief summarily avers—
in a section heading—that the arbitration panel ‘‘mani-
festly disregarded the law,’’ nowhere in this brief does
the plaintiff set forth the legal elements of a manifest
disregard of the law claim, let alone attempt to explain
how they apply in the present case. This court has
deemed more robust briefing to be inadequate. See,
e.g., Fraser Lane Associates, LLC v. Chip Fund 7, LLC,
221 Conn. App. 451, 474, 301 A.3d 1075 (2023) (defen-
dant abandoned its claim of manifest disregard when
it cited ‘‘no legal authority other than a case detailing
the elements of manifest disregard’’ and ‘‘provided only
a cursory explanation of why those elements are met’’).
It is only in its reply brief that the plaintiff argues that
the elements of manifest disregard are satisfied. It is
well settled, however, that ‘‘we consider an argument
inadequately briefed when it is delineated only in the
reply brief.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Man-
ere v. Collins, 200 Conn. App. 356, 359 n.1, 241 A.3d
133 (2020); see also State v. Elson, 311 Conn. 726, 766,
91 A.3d 862 (2014) (‘‘to receive review, a claim must
be raised and briefed adequately in a party’s principal
brief, and the failure to do so constitutes the abandon-
ment of the claim’’). We therefore also decline to review
the plaintiff’s claim that the arbitration panel manifestly
disregarded the law because the plaintiff has abandoned
that claim before this court.
The judgment is affirmed.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.