The local fire marshal shall, in accordance with the provisions of section
29-311, investigate the cause, origin and circumstances of any fire or explosion within his jurisdiction, by reason of which property has been destroyed or damaged, or any person injured or killed, or any incidents which threatened any property with destruction or damage or any person with injury or death by reason of fire or explosion, and shall especially investigate whether such fire was the result of an incendiary device or the result of carelessness, design or any criminal act; and the State Fire Marshal, or the deputy fire marshal under his direction, may supervise and direct such investigation.
(1949 Rev., S. 3672; P.A. 77-614, S. 486, 610; P.A. 81-429, S. 1; 81-472, S. 154, 159; P.A. 11-51, S. 107.)
History: P.A. 77-614 replaced commissioner of state police with commissioner of public safety, effective January 1, 1979; P.A. 81-429 required that fire marshal investigate specifically listed types of fires and explosions rather than “any fire by reason of which property has been destroyed or damaged” and deleted two-day limit for initiation of investigation following fire; P.A. 81-472 made technical corrections; Sec. 29-49 transferred to Sec. 29-302 in 1983; P.A. 11-51 deleted provision re Commissioner of Public Safety serving as State Fire Marshal, effective July 1, 2011.
Annotation to former section 29-49:
Cited. 189 C. 228.
Annotations to present section:
Once charred wood flooring samples were lawfully seized pursuant to the cause and origin investigation statutes, defendant no longer possessed a reasonable expectation of privacy in them. 246 C. 63.
Cited. 18 CA 254; 46 CA 350.
Notes of Decisions
Cited in
5
cases (
1 in the last 5 years), 1989–2025 · leading case:
State v. Bernier, 717 A.2d 652 (Conn. 1998).
State v. Bernier, 717 A.2d 652 (Conn. 1998).
· cites it 7× “General Statutes § 29-302 provides: “Investigations.”
Costanzo v. Town of Hamden, 557 A.2d 1279 (Conn. App. Ct. 1989).
· cites it 2× “The plain *257 tiff based these claims on allegations that the condition of the structure did not require immediate demolition, that the defendant did not give proper notice to the plaintiff, that the defendant did not give the plaintiff an opportunity to take alternate measures…”
State v. Bernier, 700 A.2d 680 (Conn. App. Ct. 1997).
· cites it 11× “General Statutes § 29-311 (a) allows a fire marshal to make a warrantless entry onto any premises where a fire or explosion had occurred in order (1) to investigate to determine the cause and origin of the fire or explosion, (2) to prevent the intentional or unintentional…”
State v. Michael D., 153 Conn. App. 296 (Conn. App. Ct. 2014).
· cites it 2× “6 (discussing General Statutes §§ 29-302, 29-310 and 29-311).”
State v. Sharpe (Concurrence & Dissent), No. SC20815 (Conn. Oct. 7, 2025).
· cites it 2× “In Joyce, for example, this court held that testing fire damaged clothing at the state forensic laboratory—after the police had seized that clothing in their community caretaking capacity— was an unreasonable search because the test was ‘‘capable of determining a multitude of…”
Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the
Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and
treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.