The Connecticut Supreme Court affirmed a defendant’s verdict in a civil assault claim brought by his ex-wife over an incident described by the court

The following relevant evidence was presented to the jury. The plaintiff and the defendant married one another in 1989. On December 5, 2009, the date of the incident that is the subject of the present appeal (incident), the parties resided together in their home in New Rochelle, New York. The defendant, however, purchased a house in Sharon in 1998 and recorded the deed in his name alone. According to the defendant, the plaintiff never lived in the Sharon house, except for two weeks in August, 2002. The plaintiff, however, testified that the parties spent extensive amounts of time at the Sharon house. She testified that she had painted the interior of the house in a color scheme that she had selected, had a key to the house, and kept clothing and other personal belongings there.

The defendant was a member of a historic preservation organization called The Questers. The Questers facilitated a tour of the Sharon house that the defendant arranged to take place between 2:30 and 4 p.m. on December 5, 2009. The defendant intentionally did not tell the plaintiff about the tour, did not invite her to attend, and did not want her to attend because she was not a member of The Questers. He also was ‘‘afraid that there could be some problems if she was there.’’1 The plaintiff, however, learned of the tour the morning of December 5, 2009, when she went online to find out when the Sharon Christmas tree lighting ceremony was to take place. While she was online, she saw The Questers’ posting regarding the tour of the Sharon house. The plaintiff was concerned about the cleanliness of the Sharon house because the defendant set cleaning limits. She telephoned the defendant at his Manhattan office, but was unable to reach him. According to the plaintiff, the parties had plans to attend a Christmas party in Manhattan that evening, but the defendant denied having such plans.