Dominique Menard

The defendants moved to dismiss or stay the plaintiff's action under Rule 21.01(3) due to pending related proceedings.

The court rejected arguments of res judicata and issue estoppel, finding no final determinations had been made.

It allowed the action to proceed against one defendant, Vilson Da Silva, as the claims were distinct and could not be brought in the existing lien action due to the Construction Lien Act.

However, claims against Leblon Carpentry were dismissed for lack of factual basis, and claims against Leblon Drywall were dismissed (without prejudice) as they were duplicative of an existing counterclaim in the lien action and contrary to the purpose of the Construction Lien Act.

To ensure judicial economy and avoid multiplicity of actions, the court ordered the transfer of a related Barrie action to Brampton and directed that all three interconnected actions be tried together or sequentially.

The defendants brought a motion to discharge Certificates of Pending Litigation (CPLs), alleging the plaintiff fraudulently obtained them by withholding a financial statement from a prior matrimonial file.

The plaintiff brought a cross-motion seeking to dismiss the defendants' motion as an abuse of process.

The court found that the defendants had prior knowledge of the "material and crucial" evidence but consciously chose not to present it at the original CPL motion.

Consequently, the court granted the plaintiff's motion, dismissing the defendants' motion to discharge the CPLs on the basis of abuse of process.

The court also criticized the defendants' litigation strategy and ordered that no further motions could be brought without leave of the Commercial List Team Lead.

A forest products company challenged the right of a state-owned electricity distributor to invoke a price adjustment clause in a 1926 power supply contract, arguing that the distributor was not a party to that contract.

The majority held that a 1965 bilateral contract between the distributor and the original contracting party effected a temporally limited assignment of the 1926 contract, with the assigned party's advance consent validly given in the original agreement.

As a result, the distributor was entitled to pass on to the forest products company the taxes and charges levied upon it by provincial legislation as increases in the cost of electricity generated from water power.

The dissent maintained that the trial judge had committed no reviewable error in finding that the 1965 contract created a mandate rather than an assignment, and that the Court of Appeal should not have intervened by analyzing the contract on a theory never advanced at trial.

The plaintiff underwent open-heart surgery to remove a mass that was pre-operatively diagnosed as a likely myxoma (tumor) but was post-operatively confirmed to be a thrombus (blood clot).

The plaintiff brought a medical negligence action against the involved cardiologists, cardiac surgeon, and cardiac anaesthetist, alleging they breached the standard of care by failing to diagnose the mass as a clot and treat it medically, and by failing to obtain informed consent.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the action, finding that the physicians met the standard of care in their differential diagnosis and treatment plan, as the mass had unusual features suggestive of a tumor and required surgical removal regardless.

The court also found that causation was not established and that informed consent was properly obtained.

The applicant mother sought child support from the respondent father under the Inter-Jurisdictional Support Orders Act.

The father disputed the table amount, retroactive application, and contribution to special expenses, primarily claiming undue hardship due to high debts, potential job loss, and access costs.

The court rejected the father's undue hardship claim, finding his debts were not incurred as per the Guidelines, his financial support of other adults did not trump child support, and he did not exercise access.

The court ordered child support based on the father's income, retroactive to February 2018, but declined to order contributions for daycare or soccer expenses due to insufficient evidence and the non-extraordinary nature of the soccer expense.

The father was ordered to maintain the child as a beneficiary under his medical/dental plan.