Bryan Fromstein

The defendants brought a motion for summary judgment to dismiss the plaintiff's action for breach of confidentiality and fiduciary duty.

The individual defendant, a former president of the plaintiff, was terminated without cause and signed a severance agreement with a one-year confidentiality clause.

During that year, he interviewed with and accepted a job from the corporate defendant, a competitor.

The plaintiff alleged he shared confidential information, including his resume and advice to another terminated employee.

The court found no actionable breach of confidentiality or fiduciary duty, concluding there was no genuine issue for trial.

The motion for summary judgment was granted and the action dismissed.

The plaintiff commercial tenant and defendant landlord engaged in a trial of issues regarding a commercial lease dispute.

The relationship was highly contentious, involving disagreements over the rentable area, the tenant's construction of a mezzanine and exterior shed, operating costs, and the landlord's notices of default.

The court found the landlord's default notices invalid for failing to comply with the lease and the Commercial Tenancies Act.

The court determined the rentable area excluded the mezzanine and shed, and that the tenant's additions were not structural.

The landlord was found to have breached the lease by failing to provide proper operating cost statements and breaching the covenant to repair.

The tenant validly exercised its renewal option.

However, the court ordered the tenant to pay non-lease-based rent for its unauthorized use of the exterior shed space.

The plaintiff, a former franchisee, brought a motion to amend its statement of claim to add new heads of damages following the termination of a commercial lease.

The defendant landlords opposed the amendments, arguing they were statute-barred, and brought a cross-motion for security for costs.

The court allowed the amendments for equipment and business losses, finding they arose from the factual matrix of the original pleading, but dismissed the proposed claims for breach of contract and fiduciary duty.

The court also granted the defendants' motion for security for costs, finding the corporate plaintiff had insufficient assets, its principal was not impecunious, and the plaintiff failed to demonstrate a good chance of success.

The plaintiff brought a motion seeking production of the unredacted financial statements of the corporate defendant for the years 2015 to 2017.

The plaintiff alleged the individual defendant breached a non-compete clause and sought disgorgement of benefits received by the corporate defendant.

A previous order allowed the corporate defendant to redact non-relevant information from the financial statements.

After reviewing the unredacted statements pursuant to Rule 30.06(d), the Master concluded that the redacted information was not relevant to the disgorgement claim, as the statements only provided a general high-level overview without the specific details sought by the plaintiff.

The motion for production of the unredacted statements was dismissed.

The defendant sought leave to appeal a decision allowing an examination in aid of execution of a corporate representative following default on settlement payments.

The court considered the strict test for leave to appeal under Rule 62.02(4) of the Rules of Civil Procedure.

It held there was no reason to doubt the correctness of the lower court’s decision that the Master had erred by treating examinations of a judgment debtor as discretionary and by applying principles relevant to examinations of non-parties.

The court also found no conflicting authority warranting leave and concluded that further delay would not serve the interests of justice.

Leave to appeal was refused and costs were awarded to the responding parties.

The judgment creditors appealed a master's order dismissing their motion to compel a corporate officer to attend an examination in aid of execution.

The master held that because the creditors had commenced a related action against the officer and others alleging fraudulent asset transfers, the right to conduct an examination in aid of execution had merged into the new action.

The court held that this principle applied only to examinations of third parties and not to examinations of a corporate judgment debtor through its officers under Rule 60.18(2) and (3) of the Rules of Civil Procedure.

The master therefore erred in law by concluding the creditors lost their entitlement to examine the corporate representative.

The appeal was allowed and an order was made requiring the officer to attend for examination in aid of execution.

Judgment creditors sought leave under Rule 60.18(3) of the Rules of Civil Procedure to examine a director of the judgment debtor in aid of execution following default on a settlement judgment.

Prior to the examination, the creditors commenced a separate action alleging fraudulent conveyances, bulk sales violations, and oppressive conduct relating to transfers of the debtor’s assets.

The court held that once the new action covering the same subject matter had been commenced, the purpose of an examination in aid of execution was exhausted because the creditor’s rights were merged into the action.

Allowing the examination would create an unfair multiplicity of proceedings and effectively permit duplicate discovery.

The motion was dismissed and costs were awarded to the defendant.