## Facts

- A 15-year-old girl mistakenly took a train to Stamford, Connecticut late at night and exited at the station.
- Scott Salamon followed her into a station stairwell, grabbed her by the neck, knocked her down the stairs, punched her, and attempted to force his fingers down her throat.
- The evidence indicated Salamon restrained the victim on the stairs for at least five minutes before she broke free and obtained help.
- A jury convicted Salamon of second-degree kidnapping, first-degree unlawful restraint, and risk of injury to a child.
- Salamon challenged, among other things, the kidnapping instruction for failing to require the restraint be more than incidental to the assault.

## Issues

1. Whether the kidnapping statute permits conviction when the restraint is merely incidental to, and necessary for, committing another offense, or instead requires restraint of independent criminal significance.
2. Whether the trial court misstated the intent element for first-degree unlawful restraint.
3. Whether alleged prosecutorial improprieties required a new trial on any convictions.

## Decision

- The Connecticut Supreme Court overruled its prior broad interpretation of the kidnapping statutes and adopted an “incidental restraint” limitation.
- The court reversed the second-degree kidnapping conviction and remanded for a new trial because the jury was not instructed to distinguish incidental restraint from kidnapping-level restraint.
- The court affirmed the first-degree unlawful restraint conviction, concluding the instructions, read as a whole, adequately conveyed the required intent.
- The court affirmed the risk of injury to a child conviction and found no prosecutorial impropriety warranting a new trial.

## Legal Principles

- Kidnapping requires restraint (or movement) that is not merely incidental to another offense; restraint inherent in the underlying crime does not suffice.
- The proper inquiry is whether the restraint exceeds what is necessary or inherent in committing the other crime and has independent criminal significance, including by meaningfully increasing the victim’s risk of harm.
- In kidnapping cases involving an underlying offense, juries must be instructed to evaluate the relationship between the restraint and the underlying offense when determining whether kidnapping was proved.
- First-degree unlawful restraint is a specific-intent offense requiring intent to interfere substantially with another person’s liberty; instructional error is assessed by the charge as a whole and its likelihood of misleading the jury.

## Conclusion

The court narrowed Connecticut’s kidnapping doctrine by requiring proof that restraint has independent criminal significance beyond restraint incidental to another crime, reversing and remanding the kidnapping conviction for a new trial while affirming the unlawful restraint and risk-of-injury convictions.


State v. Salamon, 287 Conn. 509, 949 A.2d 1092 (Conn. 2008)