Argued
January 15, 2019
Procedural
History
Substitute
information charging the defendant with the crime of risk of
injury to a child, brought to the Superior Court in the
judicial district of Tolland and tried to the jury before
Graham, J.; verdict and judgment of guilty, from
which the defendant appealed to this court.
Affirmed.
Robert
L. O'Brien, assigned counsel, with whom, on the brief,
was William A. Adsit, assigned counsel, for the appellant
(defendant).
Nancy
L. Walker, assistant state's attorney, with whom, on the
brief, were Matthew C. Gedansky, state's attorney, and
Elizabeth C. Leaming, senior assistant state's attorney,
for the appellee (state).
Alvord, Prescott and Eveleigh, Js.
OPINION
EVELEIGH, J.
The
defendant, Euclides L., appeals from the judgment of
conviction, rendered after a jury trial, of one count of risk
of injury to a child in violation of General Statutes §
53-21 (a) (1).[1] On appeal, the defendant claims that the
trial court violated his constitutional rights by failing to
instruct the jury that it should acquit the defendant if it
concluded that his use of force in caring for his daughter,
V, was an accident. We disagree and, accordingly, affirm the
judgment of the trial court.
The
jury reasonably could have found the following facts. The
defendant and J have one child together, V. From October,
2014, to January 9, 2015, the defendant, J and V lived
together in an apartment in Vernon. During this time, the
defendant and J were V's primary care-givers.
On
January 9, 2015, V, who was four months old at the time, was
fussy because she was suffering from a cold and had received
vaccinations two days earlier. At approximately 9:30 p.m.,
the defendant and J took V upstairs to put her to bed. While
the defendant prepared V for bed, J was downstairs, although
she periodically came upstairs to check on the defendant and
the child. At approximately 11:10 p.m., after V fell asleep,
the defendant joined J downstairs.
After
spending ‘‘about a minute [downstairs] . . . [the
defendant] asked J if [he] should wake [V] up and feed her
because she didn't eat before bed.'' After J
agreed that they should try to feed V, the defendant
‘‘grabbed [V's] bottle and went upstairs and
[woke] her up.'' When the defendant woke V, the child
began to cry hysterically. Because V was congested and
‘‘mucous was coming out of her nose in bubbles,
'' the defendant tried to suction mucous out of her
nose using a plastic bulb syringe. V wiggled and resisted the
defendant so the defendant ‘‘grabbed her
face.'' This episode lasted approximately a minute to
a minute and a half.
J, who
was downstairs while the defendant attempted to suction
V's nose, heard V crying and went upstairs to check on
the defendant and the child. As J approached the room in
which the defendant was tending to V, she heard a muffled
cry. When J entered the room, she saw that there was blood
around V's nose and that the child's skin was blue in
color. J believed that V needed oxygen and feared that this
was a side effect of the vaccinations V had received two days
earlier.[2]
J and
the defendant immediately drove V to Rockville General
Hospital (hospital). They arrived at the hospital at
approximately 11:30 p.m. While the defendant parked the car,
J ran into the hospital carrying V in her arms. J told the
hospital staff that V was turning blue and needed oxygen. V
was crying when she arrived, but stopped after being
comforted by hospital staff.
Danielle
Mailloux, a physician employed at the hospital, attended to
V. Mailloux observed a red mark under the child's nose
and a purple round mark that was approximately two
centimeters in diameter on her left cheek. During the first
two hours that V was at the hospital, this mark grew in size
and two additional marks developed on the ...