Morsy E. v. Commissioner, Connecticut Department of Children and Families

Freedom of personal choice in matters of family life and the interests of natural parents in the care, custody and control of their children are fundamental liberty interests protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Indispensable to our concept of due process is the requirement that fundamental liberty interests may not be infringed without fair warning. The questions presented are: I. Whether the Connecticut Supreme Court failed to provide constitutionally sufficient fair warning when it interpreted the State’s termination of parental rights statute to permit termination on a new and previously undisclosed basis. II. Whether, by adopting a new interpretation of Connecticut’s termination statute that includes the passage of an unknown period of time as a factor on which termination depends, the Connecticut Supreme Court has created an unconstitutionally vague procedure for terminating parental rights. (i)