Perez v. Carusillo: Best-Interest in Connecticut De Facto Parentage Must Center the Child–Petitioner Relationship, Guided by CPA § 46b-475(a), Not Custody Factors or Family Structure

1. Introduction

In Perez v. Carusillo (Supreme Court of Connecticut, officially released September 8, 2026), the court addressed how trial courts must apply the “best interest of the child” criterion in Connecticut’s de facto parentage statute, General Statutes § 46b-490(a)(7), within the Connecticut Parentage Act (CPA), General Statutes § 46b-450 et seq.

The parties were Ivan Perez (plaintiff, biological father of two children, E and C) and Nina Carusillo (defendant/stepmother). After the children’s biological mother (Rose) died, Perez and Carusillo began dating, later married, and Carusillo formed a strong parent-like bond with the children. Following dissolution proceedings, Carusillo sought adjudication as the children’s de facto parent. The trial court found she proved the first six statutory criteria by clear and convincing evidence but denied the petition on § 46b-490(a)(7), concluding continued relationship was not in the children’s best interests, heavily weighting the biological father’s opposition and importing custody factors from § 46b-56(c).

The Supreme Court reversed in part, holding that the trial court applied the wrong legal framework for § 46b-490(a)(7), improperly centered the legal parent’s custody wishes, and improperly treated the parties’ heterosexual marriage/family structure as relevant to CPA eligibility.

2. Summary of the Opinion

  • Mootness: The appeal was not moot as to E even though E turned 18 during the appeal, because a timely filed de facto parentage petition can still yield meaningful relief through enduring legal recognition and attendant rights/obligations beyond minority.
  • Merits: The trial court misapplied § 46b-490(a)(7) by importing § 46b-56(c) custody factors wholesale and assigning overriding weight to “the wishes of the child’s parents as to custody” under § 46b-56(c)(5), thereby shifting focus away from the statutory inquiry: whether continuing the petitioner–child relationship is in the child’s best interests.
  • Proper guidance: The court held that the CPA’s own best-interest factors for competing parentage claims in § 46b-475(a) provide “useful and appropriate guidance” for § 46b-490(a)(7), even if not required in every case. The best-interest analysis is holistic and may include additional relevant considerations.
  • Family structure neutrality: The CPA does not condition de facto parentage on sexual orientation, marital status, or “typical heterosexual relationship” framing; the trial court’s repeated reliance on those concepts was error.
  • Remand scope: Reversed only as to denial of the de facto parentage petition; remanded for a new hearing applying the proper legal framework.
  • Alternative ground rejected (for now): The Supreme Court declined to affirm on the plaintiff’s claim that § 46b-490(a)(6) was not proven; refusal to consent to adoption is relevant but not dispositive, and the § (a)(7) error may have affected the trial court’s evaluation of § (a)(6).

3. Analysis

3.1. Precedents Cited

The opinion uses precedent in three principal ways: (a) to establish jurisdictional mootness doctrine, (b) to supply interpretive rules for statutory construction, and (c) to situate “best interest of the child” as a flexible legal standard rather than a single-factor test.

A. Mootness and appellate jurisdiction

  • Dutkiewicz v. Dutkiewicz: Cited for the proposition that mootness implicates subject matter jurisdiction and is a threshold inquiry.
  • In re Emma F. and Williams v. Ragaglia: Used to articulate the controlling test—an actual controversy must exist throughout the appeal; events that preclude practical relief render a case moot.
  • A. A.-M. v. M. Z. and Nowacki v. Nowacki: Distinguished. Those cases treat custody/visitation appeals as moot once the child reaches majority, because custody/visitation orders terminate by operation of law at 18. The Supreme Court contrasted that context with parentage adjudication, which creates enduring legal status and consequences beyond minority.

The net doctrinal move is important: the court effectively separates “child is now an adult” mootness outcomes for custody/visitation from parentage-status adjudications, emphasizing that legal parentage carries continuing legal incidents (inheritance, medical decision-making, estate administration, etc.).

B. Statutory interpretation methodology

  • Gonzalez v. Surgeon: Cited for plenary review of statutory interpretation questions.
  • Raftopol v. Ramey and Woodbridge Newton Neighborhood Environmental Trust v. Connecticut Siting Council: Cited for the court’s interpretive objective and the primacy of the statutory text under § 1-2z.
  • In re Elianah T.-T.: Reinforces that extratextual evidence (e.g., legislative history) is not consulted unless the text is ambiguous; this undergirds the court’s critique of the trial court’s reliance on CPA legislative history to narrow applicability.
  • Patino v. Birken Mfg. Co. and Police Dept. v. State Board of Labor Relations: Support treating established legal phrases as legal terms of art, justifying the court’s approach to “best interest of the child” as a known legal standard.

C. “Best interest of the child” as a flexible standard

  • Kelsey v. Green: Cited to show the standard’s historical use in Connecticut custody disputes.
  • State v. Anonymous and Ireland v. Ireland: Used to emphasize that “best interest” lacks a single precise definition and is intentionally flexible, with much left to trial-court judgment within recognized bounds.
  • Schult v. Schult: Provides the court’s general description of best interest—growth, development, well-being, continuity and stability.
  • In re Bruce R., Cappetta v. Cappetta, and In re Appeal of Kindis: Reinforce best interest as a broad, fact-specific inquiry.

D. Parent consent and de facto parentage

  • Troxel v. Granville: Mentioned in connection with a fit parent’s constitutional interests and the presumption that fit parents act in a child’s best interest; however, the Supreme Court explicitly declined to decide Troxel’s application because the CPA’s constitutionality was not challenged.
  • Martin v. MacMahan: Cited for the reasoning that if parental consent were required to establish de facto parentage, “there could be no litigation” because a legal parent’s objection would always defeat the claim.
  • Kinney v. State: Cited for the presumption of constitutionality of legislative enactments, supporting the court’s decision to focus on the statute’s proper application rather than constitutional invalidation.
  • Independent Party of CT-State Central v. Merrill: Used to reject the plaintiff’s claim of “invited error” based on the defendant’s proposed orders.

3.2. Legal Reasoning

A. The controlling statutory question under § 46b-490(a)(7)

The Supreme Court’s core interpretive point is textual: § 46b-490(a)(7) asks whether continuing the relationship between the petitioner and the child is in the child’s best interest. The statute does not direct courts to decide who should have custody, nor does it list factors, nor does it incorporate § 46b-56(c) by reference.

Accordingly, although “best interest” is a familiar legal standard, the object of the inquiry in this setting is distinct: it is about whether legal recognition and continuation of the petitioner–child relationship serves the child’s welfare, not whether a parent’s custody preference should be honored.

B. Why wholesale importing § 46b-56(c) was error

The trial court treated § 46b-56(c)—a custody/visitation provision—as the operative best-interest framework for de facto parentage. The Supreme Court held that approach to be “misguided” because many § 46b-56(c) factors presuppose an already-established parental status and aim to resolve disputes between parents over custodial allocation. In contrast, de facto parentage determines whether the petitioner is a parent at all.

The opinion’s sharpest critique targets the trial court’s elevation of § 46b-56(c)(5) (“the wishes of the child’s parents as to custody”) as the “most pertinent” factor and the effective tie it created between (i) a fit parent’s opposition and (ii) denial of parentage. This, the Supreme Court explained, replaced the statutory focus (the child’s best interests in continuing the relationship) with a custody-dispute lens that functionally privileged the legal parent’s preference.

C. What the court endorsed instead: § 46b-475(a) as “useful and appropriate guidance”

The Supreme Court did not impose a rigid checklist, but it provided a clear doctrinal direction: the CPA’s own best-interest factors in § 46b-475(a)—even though written for “competing claims of parentage”—are well-suited to guide § 46b-490(a)(7) because they focus on:

  • the child’s age,
  • the length of time each person assumed the parental role,
  • the nature of the relationship,
  • harm from nonrecognition,
  • the basis for the claim,
  • equitable factors related to disruption/harm, and
  • any other relevant factors.

The opinion also clarifies that the § 46b-490(a)(7) inquiry is “necessarily fact intensive and holistic,” and neither § 46b-475(a) nor selected relevant § 46b-56(c) factors are exhaustive.

D. Family structure neutrality: the CPA cannot be narrowed to same-sex or nonmarital families

The trial court repeatedly referenced the “typical heterosexual relationship” and suggested that the CPA’s expansion of parentage is “generally not appropriately applied” to married heterosexual relationships or stepparents in that setting. The Supreme Court held this to be legal error for two independent reasons:

  1. Textual incompatibility: The CPA’s standing provision (§ 46b-491(a)) broadly permits any “person” claiming de facto parentage, and the substantive criteria in § 46b-490(a) focus on relationship facts, not sexual orientation or marital status. The court emphasized § 46b-472: “A parent-child relationship extends equally to every child and parent, regardless of the marital status or gender of the parent or the circumstances of the birth of the child.”
  2. Improper resort to legislative history: Under § 1-2z (as reinforced by In re Elianah T.-T.), legislative history cannot be used to narrow plain statutory text. Because the CPA is unambiguous on neutrality, legislative history could not justify the trial court’s narrowing construction.

E. Clarifying § 46b-490(a)(6): adoption refusal is relevant, not dispositive

The plaintiff argued on appeal that remand was unnecessary because the sixth criterion (§ 46b-490(a)(6))—that another parent “fostered or supported” the parental-type relationship—was not proven, chiefly because he refused to consent to adoption. The Supreme Court rejected the premise that adoption refusal is dispositive; the statutory inquiry is broader and looks to the parent’s conduct “throughout the course of the relationship.”

The court also declined to decide the evidentiary sufficiency issue on § (a)(6) at that stage because the trial court’s § (a)(7) error may have influenced how it assessed evidence relevant to § (a)(6).

3.3. Impact

Perez v. Carusillo is likely to shape CPA litigation in at least five ways:

  1. Correct framework for § 46b-490(a)(7): Trial courts are now instructed that the best-interest analysis in de facto parentage is not a custody contest and cannot be resolved primarily by weighting a legal parent’s custody preference.
  2. CPA-internal coherence: By endorsing § 46b-475(a) as “useful and appropriate guidance,” the court promotes an internal CPA best-interest vocabulary for parentage questions, reducing the tendency to default to custody statutes.
  3. Family structure neutrality is enforceable: The decision warns trial courts against narrowing CPA protections to particular family forms (e.g., same-sex couples or nonmarital households). Stepparents and partners in heterosexual marriages remain eligible if they meet the criteria.
  4. Status adjudication survives majority: The mootness holding underscores that parentage is a legal status with continuing consequences, which may increase litigants’ willingness to continue appeals even when the child approaches or reaches adulthood.
  5. Evidence development on remand and beyond: Because the court stressed holistic harm/disruption considerations, future cases will likely feature more developed records on psychological harm, relational disruption, and the practical consequences of nonrecognition of parentage (distinct from mere visitation).

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

De facto parent
A person who is not a biological/adoptive parent but has acted like a parent in a child’s life in a sustained, parental way, and meets the CPA’s seven criteria under § 46b-490(a), proven by clear and convincing evidence.
Clear and convincing evidence
A heightened burden of proof requiring evidence that is highly and substantially more likely to be true than not, stronger than “preponderance of the evidence,” but lower than “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Parentage vs. custody
Parentage determines who is a legal parent (a lasting legal status). Custody determines decision-making authority and where a minor child lives. The Supreme Court stressed that custody factors cannot be substituted for the parentage inquiry.
Best interest of the child (in de facto parentage)
In § 46b-490(a)(7), the question is whether continuing the petitioner–child relationship (and recognizing it legally) serves the child’s welfare. The court indicated § 46b-475(a) factors are appropriate guidance and emphasized a holistic assessment, including potential harm from nonrecognition and disruption of the relationship.
Mootness
A case is moot if a court can no longer provide practical relief. The court held parentage adjudication is not mooted merely because the child turns 18 during the appeal, because legal parentage affects ongoing legal rights and obligations.

5. Conclusion

Perez v. Carusillo establishes a clear rule for Connecticut de facto parentage litigation: the § 46b-490(a)(7) best-interest inquiry must be child-centered and relationship-centered, not converted into a custody-factor analysis dominated by a fit parent’s custodial wishes. Trial courts may look to the CPA’s § 46b-475(a) factors as “useful and appropriate guidance” and must avoid importing limitations based on heterosexual marriage, stepparent status, or perceived legislative “intended” family types that the CPA’s text does not impose.

The decision strengthens the CPA’s core premise—legal recognition turns on functional parent–child relationships and child welfare, assessed under a coherent parentage framework—and signals that parentage status, unlike custody orders alone, has enduring consequences that can remain justiciable after a child reaches adulthood.