Justia Vermont Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

In an interlocutory appeal, the State contested a trial court’s order granting defendant Shannon Barry’s motion to suppress statements she made to law enforcement officers before her arrest. In June 2019, the Barre City Police Department launched an investigation after Heather Larocque died from taking fentanyl-laced heroin. The investigation led the officers to believe defendant sold the fentanyl-laced heroin to Larocque. Officers found defendant enter a convenience store and asked to talk to her as she exited. At no point during the discussion, which lasted between ten and twenty minutes, did the officers tell defendant she was free to leave or to not answer their questions. Defendant never requested to leave but believed she would have been arrested if she had tried to do so. She did not feel threatened and did not feel the officers were being dishonest in their conversation with her. Throughout the conversation, defendant was not handcuffed, and the officers’ weapons remained holstered. At the conclusion of the conversation, the officers arrested defendant. At no time prior to her arrest was defendant informed of her Miranda rights. Defendant was charged with selling or dispensing a regulated drug with death resulting. The Vermont Supreme Court concluded that defendant was in custody and had not been advised of her Miranda rights outside the convenience store, therefore the Court affirmed the suppression order. View "Vermont v. Barry" on Justia Law

Applicants Marian Wright and Greg Boester and their neighbors, Day Patterson and Janet Showers, owned abutting parcels of land on the shore of Caspian Lake in Greensboro, Vermont. Neighbors appealed an Environmental Division decision granting applicants a permit to tear down and reconstruct a lakeside structure on their parcel in accordance with a revised plan they submitted just prior to trial. The Vermont Supreme Court reversed, concluding that the court erred both when it determined that the structure at issue was properly designated an “accessory structure” rather than a “boathouse” under the applicable zoning bylaws, and when it declined to remand the materially revised proposal for consideration by the municipal developmental review board in the first instance. View "In Wright & Boester Conditional Use Application (Patterson and Showers, Appellants)" on Justia Law

Masiello Real Estate, Inc. appealed a superior court’s conclusions of law on its breach-of-contract, quantum-meruit, and negligent-misrepresentation claims following a bench trial. Masiello’s claims stemmed from seller Dow Williams’ refusal to pay it a real estate commission under their right-to-market agreement. Seller owned a 276-acre property in Halifax and Guilford, Vermont. In 2013, he executed a one-year, exclusive right-to-market agreement with Chris Long, a real estate broker who worked for Masiello. Seller and broker agreed on a $435,000 asking price and a fixed $25,000 broker commission. The agreement had a one-year “tail” that compelled seller to pay the commission if, within twelve months of the agreement’s expiration, seller sold the property and Masiello was the procuring cause. The listing agreement would be renewed several times after negotiations with prospective buyers failed. Michelle Matteo and Torre Nelson expressed an interest in the property. Nelson, having obtained seller’s contact information from seller’s neighbor, contacted seller directly and asked if he was still selling. Between August and September 2016, Nelson and seller discussed the fact that seller wanted $400,000 for the property and buyers wanted seller to consider a lower price. No offer was made at that time. The tail of a third right-to-market agreement expired on September 30, 2016. Between September and November of that year, Nelson and Matteo looked at other properties with the other realtor and made an unsuccessful offer on one of those other properties. Returning to seller, Nelson, Matteo and seller negotiated until they eventually agreed to terms. Believing that it was improperly cut out of the sale, Masiello sued seller and buyers. The superior court concluded that because the property was not sold during the tail period, and because Masiello was not the procuring cause, no commission was due under the contract. The court further held that there was no negligent misrepresentation and that Masiello was not entitled to recovery under quantum meruit. Finding no reversible error in that judgment, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Masiello Real Estate, Inc. v. Matteo, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff-appellant Kevin McGrath challenged a superior court’s decision granting summary judgment to appellee Progressive Northern Insurance Company. Specifically, he argued the court erred in concluding that he was not “occupying” a vehicle, as that term is defined in the insurance policy at issue, when he was struck and injured by an underinsured motorist. Plaintiff was driving the vehicle’s owner in the owner’s vehicle to the airport. Plaintiff stopped at a gas station/convenience store on the way; he got out to pump gas and paid for it at the pump. The owner went inside the store for coffee. As the two returned to the car, but before they got inside, a pickup truck struck both plaintiff and the owner. Plaintiff filed for underinsured motorist benefits with the owner’s insurance company, Progressive, asserting he qualified for coverage under the terms of the policy. Progressive denied the claim, contending Plaintiff was not operating or occupying the car at the time of the accident. Plaintiff sued for a declaratory judgment on stipulated facts and no discovery. Summary judgment was entered in favor of the insurer. The Vermont Supreme Court affirmed, finding that while Plaintiff intended to enter the car, he did not, thus he did not occupy it under the terms of the policy at issue. View "Progressive Northern Insurance Company v. McGrath" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Zachary Rose challenged the decision of the Vermont Department of Corrections (DOC) to terminate him from treatment programming without a hearing. He argued his program termination constituted punishment under 28 V.S.A. 851, and therefore required a hearing and due process under section 852. The superior court granted summary judgment to DOC, concluding that the termination was not punishment and that plaintiff’s claim was not reviewable under Vermont Rule of Civil Procedure 75. The Vermont Supreme Court concluded that DOC’s decision was reviewable, but on this record, neither party was entitled to summary judgment. Accordingly, judgment was reversed and remanded. View "Rose v. Touchette" on Justia Law

Defendant-father Mahlon Peachey appealed a final relief-from-abuse order issued by the family division of the superior court, which prohibited father from contacting mother Sarahann Peachey or the parties’ children except during one weekly telephone call with the children. Father argued his right to due process was violated because the court conducted the evidentiary hearing remotely and he missed a portion of the hearing due to technical issues. He further argued the restrictions on parent-child contact imposed by the court were an impermissible modification of the existing contact order that was not supported by a finding of changed circumstances or an assessment of the statutory best-interests factors. Finally, he claimed the protective order had to be reversed because it is self-contradictory and not supported by the evidence. Finding no reversible error, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Peachey v. Peachey" on Justia Law

Defendant Devan Calabrese appealed his convictions for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, unlawful possession of a firearm, and violation of conditions of release, arguing that the court erred in denying his motion to suppress and permitting the State to introduce evidence that he made certain racially charged statements. After review, the Vermont Supreme Court concluded the trial court erred in concluding the trooper’s search did not violate Article 11 and the trial court’s denial of the motion to suppress was thus error. With respect to the evidence that defendant made statements evincing racial animus, the Supreme Court did not specifically rule on defendant’s challenge, but set forth the principles that should guide the trial court if the issue arose on remand. View "Vermont v. Calabrese" on Justia Law

The issue this interlocutory appeal presented for the Vermont Supreme Court's review centered on whether evidence seized by federal Border Patrol agents during a roving patrol (pursuant to their authority to conduct warrantless searches under 8 U.S.C. 1357) was admissible in a state criminal proceeding when that search did not comply with Article 11 of the Vermont Constitution. Defendants Phillip Walker-Brazie and Brandi-Lena Butterfield argued that because the overwhelming purpose of Vermont’s exclusionary rule was to protect individual liberty, the Supreme Court should apply the exclusionary rule and suppress the evidence pursuant to Article 11. To this the Supreme Court agreed, holding that such evidence is inadmissible in Vermont criminal proceedings. View "Vermont v. Walker-Brazie" on Justia Law

In an interlocutory appeal, defendants challenged the trial court’s denial of their motion to dismiss plaintiff’s medical malpractice claim. They contended dismissal was required because plaintiff did not file a certificate of merit (COM) with her complaint as required by 12 V.S.A. 1042(a) and the trial court did not find, nor did the complaint show, that this was a “rare instance” where expert testimony was unnecessary under section 1042(e). The Vermont Supreme Court agreed with defendants and therefore reversed the trial court’s decision. View "Bittner v. Centurion of Vermont, LLC et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs were W.H. and B.H., who were abused as children, and their grandparents. They brought this tort action for damages in 2014, arguing that DCF failed to accept or respond to dozens of reports of physical and sexual abuse of the children between 2008 and 2012. Among other things, plaintiffs made claims of negligence based on the Vermont Department for Children and Families’ (DCF) failure to perform its statutory obligations and negligent undertaking. The State moved for summary judgment on all counts, arguing in part that the State did not breach any duty owed to plaintiffs, that the State was entitled to sovereign immunity because its actions were discretionary and grounded in public policy, and that plaintiffs could not prove causation. In June 2019, the trial court denied DCF’s motion for summary judgment, and the case proceeded to trial. After the close of the evidence, the trial court granted the State’s motion for judgment as a matter of law on the record, holding that even if the jury accepted all plaintiffs’ evidence as true and made all reasonable inferences in favor of plaintiff, “the jury could not find the presence of proximate causation.” It determined that the jury would have had to speculate as to “what actions [DCF] would have taken had they acted on reports of maltreatment of the children that were made and not acted upon” as well as “what it is that would have happened had DCF received that report and acted on it.” Plaintiffs challenged the trial court’s decision granting judgment as a matter of law to the State. They argued the court erred in narrowing the scope of DCF's legally actionable duty and in concluding that no reasonable jury could find that DCF’s actions were the proximate cause of then-children B.H. and W.H.’s injuries. They also argued the discretionary function exception to the State’s tort liability did not bar their claim and that the trial court improperly considered factors other than the law and evidence in granting the State judgment as a matter of law. Finding no reversible error, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Stocker, et al. v. Vermont, et al." on Justia Law