Enders Island Lawsuit: Neighbors’ Claims, 1954 Deed, and Kenyon Center

The Enders Island lawsuit is an active Connecticut case, filed in May 2018, in which seven Masons Island homeowners are trying to force St. Edmund’s Retreat to scale back operations on the small island off Mystic. The plaintiffs argue the Catholic retreat center has drifted far beyond both its 1954 donor deed and Stonington’s residential zoning, and they want a permanent injunction against the events, programs, and traffic that come with roughly 17,000 annual visitors. As of 2026, no trial or final judgment has been reported.¹

What the Neighbors Are Suing Over

The complaint, Hugh P. McGee, Jr., et al. v. St. Edmund of Connecticut, Inc., et al., was filed in New London Superior Court and later docketed in Hartford as HHD-CV18-6112233-S. The plaintiffs — Michael R. Deangelis, Sara H. Lathrop, Lydia A. Herd, Hugh P. McGee Jr., Kay G. Tower, Penelope Townsend, and Daniel H. Van Winkle — are represented by attorney Diane Whitney of Pullman and Comley LLC. The defendants are St. Edmund of Connecticut, Inc., St. Edmund’s Retreat Inc., and the Society of St. Edmund Inc.¹

The suit raises three main counts:

Zoning violations. Enders Island was rezoned from RA-3, which allowed religious uses, to residential in 1977. That made the retreat a legally nonconforming use, and the plaintiffs argue the operation has expanded well beyond what nonconforming status permits.
Breach of the 1954 deed. Alys Enders’ quit-claim deed restricted the property to use as a novitiate for the Society of St. Edmund and a retreat for priests of the Diocese of Norwich. If those conditions fail, the deed calls for the island to revert to her heirs and legatees.
Nuisance. Every visitor to the island crosses narrow, sidewalk-less private roads on Masons Island. The plaintiffs claim the volume produces traffic, safety hazards, road damage, and noise.

The activities the neighbors point to as unauthorized commercial use include counseling and addiction recovery programs, a gift shop, business meetings and seminars, garden club cocktail parties, craft fairs, private fundraising dinners, wedding and funeral receptions, and marketing of the island to vacationers and bed-and-breakfast guests.²

The homeowners went to court only after administrative options ran out. They filed zoning complaints in August 2017; the Stonington Planning Department inspected the island and issued a report finding no violations. Two residents appealed to the Stonington Zoning Board of Appeals in January 2018, and the board declined to hear the case for lack of jurisdiction.¹

How the Retreat Center Is Defending Itself

St. Edmund’s denies operating commercially. The retreat characterizes its events, including meetings, conferences, cocktail gatherings, and “Holy Smoke Cigar Dinners,” as activities that advance its religious and charitable purposes. It also points to the town planner’s finding of no zoning violations.²

The defense leans heavily on religious liberty law. St. Edmund’s invokes the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) and its Connecticut counterpart, arguing that enforcing zoning restrictions against the retreat would impose a substantial burden on its religious exercise without a compelling government interest. The retreat also compares itself to the Masons Island Yacht Club, a secular assembly use next to the causeway, and says restricting the retreat while letting the yacht club operate would treat a religious use worse than a comparable secular one.²

Beyond the religious exercise arguments, the defendants say the case is too late. They cite Connecticut’s three-year statute of limitations and the doctrine of laches, arguing that residents have known about the retreat’s activities since the 1970s. They also challenge the plaintiffs’ standing to enforce the deed restrictions. In April 2021, St. Edmund’s asked leave to amend its answer to add a special defense under Connecticut General Statutes § 52-571b, the state-law RLUIPA analog. Available records do not show a ruling on the merits of that defense.²

The 1954 Deed and the Ownership Side-Case

The deed matters for two reasons. Its use restrictions drive the plaintiffs’ reversion theory, and its reversionary clause has also produced a separate quiet title action brought by St. Edmund of Connecticut, Inc. to clear ownership so the retreat can proceed with improvements, including a proposed shoreline project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.³

By the time the quiet title action was filed, the retreat had obtained quitclaim deeds from 33 of Alys Enders’ heirs, accounting for 94.375% of the reversionary interest. Three holdouts remain: Mystic Seaport Museum (1.25%), the Girl Scouts of Connecticut (1.25%), and John Steffian (3.125%). Rev. Thomas Hoar, the retreat’s president, argues that any reversionary claims lapsed by 1970 through adverse possession and Connecticut’s 15-year statute of limitations. Mystic Seaport Museum moved to strike the complaint on the ground that St. Edmund’s failed to name the Connecticut Attorney General as a necessary party. The outcome is not reflected in available records.³⁴

The 2024 Kenyon Recovery Center Fight

The conflict widened in 2024. St. Edmund’s Retreat applied for a site plan permit to build the Kenyon Recovery Center, a $3 million, two-story, 6,600-square-foot facility to consolidate its addiction recovery programs. The plan would demolish two older structures and unused storage sheds and replace them with a building containing 12 residential rooms for program participants, meeting rooms, a studio apartment, a library, and staff offices.⁵

At a March 2024 Stonington Planning and Zoning Commission hearing, attorney Amy Souchuns argued for the opposition that the commission could not approve the project while an unresolved zoning violation existed on the property, pointing to what she called an illegal parking lot expansion. She also argued the new building would exceed the site’s maximum floor area ratio and impermissibly expand a nonconforming use. The commission voted unanimously to continue the hearing to April 16, 2024, and asked for updated maps, surveys, floor area ratio calculations, a phasing plan, and traffic studies from 2004 and 2018. Stonington Zoning Enforcement Officer Candace Palmer had separately determined in February 2024 that no zoning violation existed regarding the parking lot; residents appealed that determination, and the Zoning Board of Appeals set its own hearing for April 9, 2024.⁵

Where Things Stand

The 2018 case is still open. The deed restriction counts were bifurcated early and deferred, while the zoning and nuisance claims continued through the court. The RLUIPA defense has been pleaded but not resolved on the merits. Public records do not show final outcomes on the Kenyon Recovery Center site plan, the parking lot appeal, the quiet title action, or the Army Corps seawall project that helped set off the broader dispute in 2017. The underlying question has not moved: whether a Catholic retreat drawing tens of thousands of visitors a year has outgrown a 70-year-old donor deed and the residential zoning Stonington adopted in 1977.

1
The Westerly Sun. Masons Island Residents File Lawsuit to Restrict Enders Island Activities
2
Squarespace (Court Filing). St. Edmund Request for Leave to Amend Answer
3
The Westerly Sun. Dispute Over Ownership of Enders Island Is Headed to Court
4
Squarespace (Court Filing). Mystic Seaport Museum’s Memorandum of Law in Support of Its Motion to Strike the Complaint
5
The Day. New Enders Island Construction Subject of Contentious Public Hearing