Although the Restatement (Second) of Torts recommends the abrogation of parental immunity; see footnote 10; it cautions against imposing liability when the parental conduct involves acts of supervision or discretion that are necessitated by the nature of the familial relationship between the parent and the unemancipated minor child. See also Ooms v. Ooms, 164 Conn. 48, 316 A.2d 783 (1972) (parental immunity doctrine extends to parent's negligence in allowing child to cross highway alone); Pettengill v. Pettengill, 18 Conn. App. 557, 559 A.2d 240, cert. denied, 212 Conn. 808, 563 A.2d 1356 (1989) (father allowing daughter to ride on housing of lawn mower while in use was within realm of parental discretion with regard to the care, supervision and instruction of child and parental immunity extends to such parental discretion); Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987) (parental immunity extends to negligence actions brought by a child against a parent). 4 Restatement (Second), Torts 895G, comment (k) provides in part that: "Conduct involving the exercise of parental authority or supervision is essential to the parent-child relationship.

Decided January 15, 1987 The plaintiff's petition for certification for appeal from the Appellate Court, 9 Conn. App. 290, is denied. Michael W. Levy, in support of the petition.

Although the very words of the statute provide a sufficient basis on which to determine when the operation must occur in order for state liability to attach, our view that summary judgment should have been granted is reinforced by existing cases that have defined "operation" of a motor vehicle within the context of other statutes. In Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987), this court determined that the defendant was not "operating" a motor vehicle within the terms of General Statutes 52-572c, a statutory exception to the doctrine of parental immunity. In that case, the defendant's minor son injured himself when he roller-skated into the defendant's parked, disabled car.

Id., at 52. Unlike the court in Ooms, the appellate court addressed the meaning of the phrase " operation of a motor vehicle" under § 52-572c in Jackson v. Jackson, 9 Conn.App. 290, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987). In this case, the minor plaintiff brought suit against his mother for personal injuries that he suffered when he roller skated into the bent antenna of a car that the defendant had parked in the driveway of the family home.

These cases are of some value but they are not determinative of the issue now before the court since the definition of "operation" in a particular statute depends in large part on the policy objectives the statute was trying to accomplish — or to perhaps put it a better way, beyond the clear case where a person is actually driving a vehicle on the highway, it becomes a matter of policy objective as to whether acts, having nothing to do with actually driving a car, but incident to driving or attempting to drive ought to be defined as "operation" — the word "ought" is the problem and that requires an examination of statutory purpose. Only two cases apparently have tried to interpret the meaning of "operating a motor vehicle" under § 52-572c, Ooms v. Ooms, 164 Conn. 48 (1972) and Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290 (1986). In Jackson, a child was injured when she skated into the antenna of a parked car, the court held, citing State v. Swift, supra, and Nichols v. Watson, supra, that although "operation" has been held to include cases where a vehicle is parked incident to travel that was not what was involved in the case before it. Id., 292.

ating the motor vehicle at the time of the incident and research has not disclosed such authority. No legislative history exists to aid in the determination of whether the legislature intended the exception of § 52-556 to apply to instances where a plaintiff, who is not a state employee, is injured while operating a state owned and insured motor vehicle at the direction of a state employee. Courts have, however, interpreted the meaning of the word "operate" in various contexts to mean related to the driving or movement of the vehicle itself or a circumstance resulting from the movement of the vehicle; see e.g., Davey v. Penneridae Farms, Inc., 180 Conn. 469, 429 A.2d 943 (1980); Cirillo v. Sardo, 41 Conn. App. 664, 676 A.2d 1388, cert. denied, 239 Conn. 904, 682 A.2d 998 (1996); performing a function related to the movement of the vehicle itself; see e.g., Dias v. Adams, 189 Conn. 354, 456 A.2d 309 (1983); Cirillo v. Sardo, supra; and stopped incident to travel or movement; see e.g.,Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987). In each of those cases, the motor vehicle was being operated by a state employee at the time of the incident.

Id. Similarly, Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987), affirmed a summary judgment in favor of the defendant where the plaintiff, minor child of the defendant, was injured when he roller-skated into the bent antenna of a car which the defendant had parked in her driveway two days earlier because it was inoperable. The appeals court held that "[i]njuries sustained which are unrelated to the movement of the vehicle, or the circumstances of the movement of the vehicle, do not arise in the course of the operation of the motor vehicle."

"Cases decided pursuant to that statute are instructive." Jackson v. Jackson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 292, 518 A.2d 666 (1986), cert. denied, 202 Conn. 804, 519 A.2d 1208 (1987). In both cases the court held that the starting point for analysis must be the insurance policy and that the statute, § 38a-336, and the administrative regulation promulgated thereunder were relevant only to determine if a policy provision providing for such a credit was valid.

The statutory exception has been narrowly construed by the Appellate Court on two occasions. In Pettengill v. Pettengill, 18 Conn. App. 557 (1989), cert. denied 212 Conn. 808, which involved a negligence action where a minor plaintiff fell from a tractor and brought suit against his father, and in Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290 (1986), cert. denied 202 Conn. 804, where a minor plaintiff roller-skated into his parents' parked car, the court held that the exceptions contained in 52-572c did not apply, and in each case the action against the parent was barred. The plaintiff directs the court's attention to the case of Dubay CT Page 6624-G v. Irish, 207 Conn. 518, 542 (1988), wherein the court stated that the doctrine of parental immunity "bars an unemancipated minor from suing his or her parent for injuries caused by the negligence of that parent."

The general rule is that use of a car within the context of both an automobile insurance policy and a statute requires the showing of a connection between the use of the automobile and the accident or injury, which usually requires the setting in motion of the operative machinery of the vehicle or its movement or something resulting from an activity incidental to the movement of the vehicle from one place to another. Hogle v. Hogle, 167 Conn. 572, 577; Dias v. Adams, 189 Conn. 354, 359, 360; Jackson v. Johnson, 9 Conn. App. 290, 292; Rivera v. Fox, 20 Conn. App. 619, 624; Kiriaka v. Alterwitz, 7 Conn. App. 575, 578. Moreover, even if the vehicle is being operated at the time of the injury, recovery is generally disallowed when there is no causal connection between operation of the motor vehicle and the injury. Hughes v. National Car Rental, 22 Conn. App. 586 (operator of one car shot the operator of another car).