Felicitas Nkiru Agbakwa

A temporary care and custody motion under Part V of the Child, Youth and Family Services Act, 2017.

The Children's Aid Society sought to place three children (ages 11, 7, and 4) in its temporary care and custody with discretionary access to their parents.

The mother sought custody or generous parenting time; the father sought joint or sole custody, or alternatively placement with his sister.

The court found reasonable grounds to believe the children would suffer harm if returned to either parent's care and that supervision terms would be inadequate.

The court placed the children in the society's temporary care and custody, with the mother's access fully supervised and the father granted minimum weekly unsupervised visits subject to conditions.

The decision addresses physical abuse allegations, emotional harm, parental emotional dysregulation, and the children's expressed wishes to remain in foster care.

The appellant suffered a brain injury resulting in anterograde amnesia and confabulation.

The respondent psychiatrist found the appellant incapable of managing her property under the Substitute Decisions Act, 1992, a finding confirmed by the Consent and Capacity Board.

The appellant appealed to the Superior Court of Justice.

The court applied a reasonableness standard of review and dismissed the appeal, finding the Board's conclusion was supported by the evidence despite the appellant's limited assets.

The applicant mother brought a motion to strike the respondent father's pleadings for non-compliance with court orders, seeking termination or discretionary access to the child, child support, and vacation of the upcoming court date.

The respondent father failed to attend the hearing despite being served with notice.

The court found that the father had not exercised access since February 2016, failed to provide financial disclosure, and had not attended court since February 2016.

The court struck the father's pleadings, allowing the mother to proceed unopposed, confirmed the mother's custody, made access discretionary to the mother subject to the child's wishes, and declined to order child support given the father's receipt of Ontario Works and apparent mental health issues.

The father sought permission to travel outside Canada with the three children and to obtain their passports without the mother's consent.

The mother opposed the application, alleging the father intended to permanently remove the children to Somalia.

The court dismissed the mother's jurisdictional motion challenging whether the proceeding should have been commenced by motion to change rather than application.

On the merits, the court found that it was in the best interests of the children to permit travel with the father and to allow him to obtain passports without maternal consent, subject to specified conditions including notice requirements and a prohibition on travel to Somalia.