Civil Litigation - Defendant

The plaintiff in the Severance action moved for an order extending the time to set two related motor vehicle accident cases down for trial until December 31, 2024.

All parties consented except the Ministry of Transportation and Carillion Canada.

The court found that the opposing defendants would not be prejudiced by the extension, whereas the plaintiffs and other defendants would suffer prejudice if forced to set the actions down while a leave to appeal decision regarding discovery refusals was pending.

The motion to extend the time was granted.

The self-represented applicant brought a 14B motion seeking leave to appeal a prior order that restricted further motions without permission.

The court clarified that the prior order was not intended to apply to motions for leave to appeal or stay the order itself.

The court granted permission for the motion, if required, and directed the applicant to serve and file the motion in the regular course pursuant to the Rules of Civil Procedure.

The defendant in a defamation action brought a motion for the production and preservation of documents from non-parties, as well as a sealing order and publication ban regarding the identities and medical information of two non-party insured individuals.

The court granted the unopposed production orders.

Applying the Sherman Estate test, the court granted the sealing order and publication ban for one insured whose identity remained anonymous, but dismissed the request for the other insured whose identity was already public and where the scope of the requested health information ban was too vague.

The plaintiff, Humi Holdings Corporation, brought a motion for an interlocutory injunction to prevent former employees and their new company from competing and using alleged confidential information to develop an embedded payroll software product.

The court admitted expert evidence from both sides.

Applying the RJR-MacDonald test, the court found that the plaintiff failed to establish a strong prima facie case that the non-competition clauses were enforceable or breached, or that confidential information was misused.

Furthermore, the plaintiff failed to demonstrate irreparable harm, and the balance of convenience favored the defendants.

The motion was dismissed with costs awarded to the defendants.

The plaintiff in a defamation action brought a motion for leave to amend his statement of claim, including adding his professional corporation as a plaintiff, and alternatively sought to extend the time to issue a statement of claim in a placeholder action.

A non-party sought and was granted leave to intervene to oppose certain amendments.

The court denied the amendment to add the professional corporation on the basis of issue estoppel, as a previous judge had already denied the same request.

The court also denied amendments that improperly sought document production or contained scandalous information about the non-party.

The motion to extend time in the placeholder action was dismissed as an abuse of process and a collateral attack on the previous judge's order.

Success being divided, no costs were awarded.

The plaintiff registered a construction lien against the defendants' property and noted the defendants in default after they failed to deliver a statement of defence.

The defendants subsequently sought to bring a motion to discharge the lien on the basis that it had expired because the plaintiff failed to set the action down for trial within two years.

The court considered the preliminary issue of whether the defendants had standing to bring the motion despite being noted in default.

The court granted the defendants leave under section 5(2) of O. Reg 302/18 to bring the motion, finding there was evidence to support the defence that the lien had expired.

The applicant sought damages after the respondent wrongfully refused to discharge a vendor take-back mortgage upon full payment.

The respondent's refusal prevented the applicant from refinancing the property, causing him to lose a lucrative opportunity to purchase another commercial investment property.

The court found the respondent breached its contractual obligation to discharge the mortgage within a reasonable time and acted in bad faith.

The court awarded the applicant $150,375 in compensatory damages for the lost opportunity, but dismissed the claim for punitive damages as there was no independent actionable wrong.

The plaintiff brought a motion for summary judgment against its former president and sole director, alleging he engaged in a fraudulent scheme involving excessive or non-existent expenses and forged signatures.

The plaintiff relied heavily on a forensic accountant's report, but failed to provide direct evidence from individuals with knowledge of the facts underlying the accountant's assumptions.

The court dismissed the motion, finding the plaintiff's evidentiary record insufficient to establish that there was no genuine issue for trial regarding the alleged misrepresentations and fraud.

The applicants sought a declaration that their insurer, CNA, had a duty to defend them in an underlying action for property damage caused by a liquid chlorine leak from their pool supply store into an adjacent unit.

CNA denied coverage, relying on the policy's pollution exclusion.

The court found that the pollution exclusion did not apply because the chlorine leaked into an adjacent indoor premises, not the natural environment, and the underlying claim was for property damage rather than environmental remediation.

The court declared that CNA has a duty to defend the applicants and awarded the applicants their defence costs incurred to date.

The plaintiff moved to disqualify Norton Rose Fulbright LLP (NRF) from acting as lawyers of record for the K2 defendants.

The plaintiff argued that it was a current client of NRF for patent applications, and that NRF's representation of the K2 defendants in this litigation, which involved allegations that the plaintiff's core technology did not exist, created a disqualifying conflict of interest.

The court found that the two mandates were substantially related and that the bright line rule applied, rendering the advance waiver in NRF's engagement letter ineffective.

The motion to disqualify NRF was granted.

The applicant bank mistakenly paid funds to the respondents' corporate account instead of garnishing them as required by a court order.

The respondents then transferred the funds to another bank to avoid garnishment.

The bank subsequently paid $90,000 to the garnishor out of its own pocket to rectify its error.

The bank brought an application to recover the funds from the respondents based on mistake of fact and unjust enrichment.

The court found that the bank made a mistake of fact and that the respondents were unjustly enriched by the $90,000 payment made on their behalf.

The court ordered the respondents to repay the $90,000 to the bank.

The applicant security company sought a declaration that it was an additional insured under a builder's risk insurance policy issued by the respondent to a construction company.

The applicant provided security services at a construction site that was vandalized and set on fire, leading to an underlying negligence action against the applicant.

The applicant argued it was a 'supplier' under the policy.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the plain and ordinary meaning of the policy clearly excluded suppliers who perform no construction work, thereby excluding the applicant.

The defendants, a law firm and one of its partners, brought a motion to strike the plaintiffs' statement of claim for disclosing no reasonable cause of action.

The plaintiffs alleged that the defendants breached an ad hoc fiduciary duty and aided and abetted a breach of an undertaking and a breach of the Business Corporations Act while representing a corporation in an employment matter.

The court granted the motion to strike without leave to amend, finding no facts to support a fiduciary relationship and holding that the claims for aiding and abetting were contrary to public policy as they would interfere with the lawyer-client relationship.

The plaintiff paving contractor sued the defendant general contractor for unpaid invoices and extras on a construction project (the Archmill project).

The plaintiff had also refused to perform work on a second, unrelated project (the Burgessville project) until it was paid for the first.

The court found that the plaintiff was entitled to payment for some, but not all, of the disputed extras on the first project.

However, the court also held that the plaintiff's refusal to work on the second project constituted an anticipatory breach of contract.

The defendant was awarded damages for the extra costs incurred to complete the second project, and the court allowed the defendant to equitably set off those damages against the amount owed to the plaintiff on the first project.

The plaintiff's claim for breach of trust under the Construction Act was dismissed.

The respondents were previously found in civil contempt for failing to comply with multiple court orders requiring disclosure, accounting, and tracing of assets.

At the sentencing hearing, the court found that the respondents had still not purged their contempt.

The court ordered a 30-day custodial sentence for one respondent, stayed for approximately one month to provide a final opportunity to comply, and ordered the respondents to pay $30,000 in substantial indemnity costs.

The defendants were successful on a motion to strike the plaintiff's statement of claim in its entirety, with leave to amend.

The defendants sought costs of $41,979.61, relying on an offer to settle that would have allowed the plaintiff to amend his claim.

The self-represented plaintiff argued he was impecunious and that success was divided.

The court found the defendants were overwhelmingly successful and that the plaintiff's impecuniosity did not shield him from a costs award, though it was a factor in reducing the quantum.

Costs were fixed at $15,000 payable by the plaintiff.

Two brothers co-owned a family cottage and entered into a co-ownership agreement without legal advice.

When the plaintiff sought to sell his share, a dispute arose over the interpretation and validity of the buy-sell provision.

The plaintiff applied to enforce the provision or alternatively for a sale under the Partition Act, while the defendant applied for rectification of the agreement to match an earlier draft.

The Superior Court of Justice found the buy-sell provision void for uncertainty as it constituted an unenforceable agreement to agree.

The court dismissed the defendant's claim for rectification, finding no evidence of fraud or equivalent conduct.

Ultimately, the court ordered the sale of the property pursuant to the Partition Act and directed the net proceeds to be divided equally.

The plaintiff moved to strike the defendant's statement of defence due to the defendant's failure to pay over $49,000 in prior costs awards.

The defendant argued he had attempted to pay by monthly installments, which the plaintiff refused after an initial payment.

The court dismissed the motion to strike, finding the defendant's conduct did not yet warrant the severe remedy of striking his pleading.

However, the court refused to order a payment plan and imposed a peremptory 30-day deadline for the defendant to pay the outstanding costs in full, failing which the plaintiff could renew the motion to strike.

The moving party appealed a previous order vesting title of his real estate to the respondent estate and sought a stay of any sale of the property pending the appeal.

The parties consented to a stay until June 15, 2023, but disagreed on whether it should continue until the appeal's disposition if no decision was made by that date.

Applying the three-part test for an injunction, the court found a serious issue to be tried, potential irreparable harm if the property was sold, and that the balance of convenience favoured the moving party.

The court ordered the stay to continue until the disposition of the appeal.

The defendants sought an adjournment of a five-day trial because one of the named defendants was scheduled to undergo spinal surgery.

The plaintiffs' counsel refused to consent to the adjournment, demanding medical records and authorizations to speak directly with the defendant's treating physicians.

The court granted the adjournment, finding the plaintiffs' counsel's demands inappropriate and contrary to the principles of professionalism, and ordered that the plaintiffs could not recover costs incurred after being notified of the adjournment request.