Freya Kristjanson

The respondent wife moved for interim spousal support following a short 10-month marriage.

The applicant husband had sponsored the wife for Canadian citizenship and conceded entitlement to support but failed to provide adequate financial disclosure.

The court imputed an annual income of $200,000 to the husband based on his lifestyle and undisclosed assets/corporate interests.

The court ordered the husband to pay $4,595.00 per month in interim spousal support, retroactive to the date of the Answer, and lump sum retroactive support to the date of separation, considering the immigration sponsorship undertaking and the wife's need.

The husband was also directed to produce the sponsorship agreement and immigration file.

The birth mother (D.D.) appealed the dismissal of her application for an openness order regarding her Crown ward son (S.S.), who had been adopted in 2017.

The Children's Aid Society of Toronto (CAST) brought a motion to dismiss the appeal.

The court upheld the application judge's decision, finding that the birth mother lacked standing to seek an openness order post-adoption under the Child and Family Services Act.

The court also ruled that new issues concerning the validity of the adoption, not raised in the original application, could not be introduced for the first time on appeal.

CAST's motion to dismiss the appeal was granted, and D.D. was ordered to pay costs due to her unreasonable litigation conduct.

The applicant father brought a motion seeking a change in the child's primary residence, expanded access, and an urgent trial on custody and access issues.

The respondent mother had repeatedly and unilaterally denied the father access to their seven-year-old son, flagrantly disobeying multiple court orders, including consent orders.

The court found the mother's actions were harming the child and constituted alienating behaviour.

Exercising its discretion under the Family Law Rules and considering the child's best interests under the Children's Law Reform Act, the court ordered a change in the child's primary residence to the father, set an access schedule for the mother, and scheduled an urgent trial.

The court also awarded the father full recovery costs of $6,000 due to the mother's unreasonable conduct and non-compliance.

The respondent was found in civil contempt for continuing to operate a parking lot in contravention of a zoning by-law and a court injunction.

The contempt was subsequently purged when the parking lot was shut down.

The court accepted a joint submission from the parties and ordered the respondent to pay a $25,000 fine, which removed any profit gained from the contemptuous operation of the lot.

The applicant brought a contempt motion to enforce a final order regarding the return of household possessions.

The applicant had hired private investigators to surreptitiously enter the respondent's home under false pretenses to take photographs and videos of the items.

The court dismissed the contempt motion, holding that contempt is a remedy of last resort in family law and should not be used as a first step for enforcement.

The court also noted it would have declined to exercise its discretion to grant contempt due to the applicant's unacceptable conduct in using private investigators.

Furthermore, the court criticized the applicant's counsel for failing to comply with principles of civility and professionalism by unilaterally scheduling the motion and refusing reasonable adjournment requests.

At a Trial Management Conference, the court addressed the issues for trial between the applicant father and the self-represented respondent mother.

The court provided detailed explanations of the legal frameworks governing custody of a 16-year-old, medical decision-making, and interim disbursements to ensure the self-represented mother understood the critical choices she faced.

The court directed the parties to attend another Trial Management Conference to clarify the remaining issues, including whether an equalization claim had been properly advanced and how to efficiently manage the custody claims.

The parties separated in 2013 after a 14-year marriage.

The applicant sought child support, section 7 expenses, spousal support, and equalization of net family property.

The respondent, who went on long-term disability in 2015, also sought spousal support.

The court determined the respondent's income based on his long-term disability benefits and the applicant's income based on her corporate earnings, adjusting for personal benefits.

The court ordered table child support and allocated section 7 expenses proportionally.

Both claims for spousal support were dismissed as neither party suffered economic disadvantage from the marriage.

The court also resolved numerous disputes regarding equalization of net family property and post-separation adjustments for jointly owned real estate, ultimately ordering the applicant to pay the respondent a net amount of $76,876.51.

The respondent mother brought a motion to vary an interim access order that required her to transport the parties' 19-month-old child from Windsor to Toronto for weekend access with the applicant father.

The mother argued that the child's age, winter driving conditions, and the child's familiarity with the father's home constituted a material change in circumstances.

The court dismissed the motion, finding no material change in circumstances that would justify varying the interim order, and noted that the mother had unilaterally removed the child from Toronto to Windsor prior to the initial order.

The appellant father appealed a final restraining order that prohibited him from attending within 500 metres of the respondent mother's home, work, church, or college, and their child's school or daycare.

The appellant argued the order should include a knowledge requirement since he did not know the addresses, and challenged the motions judge's imposition of preconditions (remorse and counselling) for reviewing the order.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the knowledge requirement ground as it was raised for the first time on appeal, but struck the preconditions, finding the motions judge breached procedural fairness by imposing them without notice and exceeded his jurisdiction under the Family Law Act.

The applicant mother brought an urgent motion for sole custody and a graduated access schedule for her two children, who reside with her in Ontario.

The respondent father, residing in Italy, failed to exercise access for 19 months and initiated criminal abduction proceedings against the mother in Italy.

The court found that the father was validly served in Italy by a private process server under Article 10(c) of the Hague Convention on Service Abroad.

The court granted default judgment, awarding sole custody to the mother and ordering a graduated access schedule for the father in Ontario, finding it in the children's best interests.

The plaintiffs sued the defendant, a cousin and former employee, for trespass, conversion, and breach of confidence following a theft at their home.

The court found that the defendant, acting in concert with the plaintiffs' housekeeper, used confidential information about the home's security and the location of valuables to enter the home and steal jewelry, cash, and a security system.

The court relied on circumstantial evidence, including extensive phone records between the defendant and the housekeeper, and found the defendant's testimony lacked credibility.

The defendant was held liable and ordered to pay compensatory damages for the stolen items and $5,000 in punitive damages.

The plaintiff staffing agency brought a motion for summary judgment for unpaid invoices relating to temporary workers provided to the defendant.

The defendant admitted liability for the invoices but raised an equitable set-off defence, alleging the plaintiff was negligent or breached the contract in relation to a prior fraudulent scheme orchestrated by the defendant's own manager involving 'phantom labourers'.

The court granted summary judgment, finding that the equitable set-off defence failed because the prior fraudulent invoices were not sufficiently closely connected to the unpaid invoices to directly impeach the plaintiff's claim.

The plaintiff employer brought a motion for partial summary judgment seeking to enforce a non-competition clause against a former software developer who resigned to work for a competitor.

The defendants brought cross-motions seeking a declaration that the clause was void.

The court found the matter appropriate for partial summary judgment.

The court held that the non-competition clause was overly broad in its scope of prohibited activities, geographic scope, and temporal scope, and was ambiguous.

The clause was declared unreasonable, unenforceable, and void ab initio.

The respondent father moved to set aside a default judgment obtained after an uncontested trial, arguing he was unaware of the proceedings and had an arguable defense regarding a joint family venture and imputed income for child support.

The court found the father moved promptly, provided a plausible explanation for non-participation due to lack of notice, and demonstrated arguable defenses.

The court set aside the default judgment and associated costs, dismissing the applicant's cross-motion to compel compliance with the original order.

The moving party, who had previously been declared a vexatious litigant, brought a motion seeking leave to commence an application to vary a foreign spousal support order and register it under the Interjurisdictional Support Orders Act.

As the Family Law Rules do not specify the procedure for seeking leave under section 140(3) of the Courts of Justice Act, the court issued procedural directions by analogy to the Rules of Civil Procedure.

The court directed that the matter proceed by way of application, required service on the Attorney General, and identified substantive jurisdictional and res judicata issues the moving party must address at the hearing.

The applicant tenant sought a declaration that its commercial lease was valid and binding on the new owner of the building.

The applicant had signed a new five-year lease with the previous landlord, but the landlord claimed it was never received.

Both parties, however, acted as if the lease were in effect, with the applicant paying increased rent.

The new owner purchased the building and claimed the applicant was a month-to-month tenant, seeking to significantly increase the rent.

The court found that the lease was valid and enforceable through the doctrine of part performance.

Furthermore, the court held that the unregistered lease was binding on the new owner because the new owner was wilfully blind to the existence of the lease during the purchase process.

Following a ten-day trial regarding an estate dispute where success was divided, the parties sought costs.

The applicants sought substantial indemnity costs of over $343,000, while the respondent sought partial indemnity costs of over $172,000.

The court reviewed the modern costs rules governing estates litigation and the indemnification of estate trustees.

Finding that all parties acted unreasonably in certain respects, were motivated by self-interest, and that the litigation fees were disproportionate to the estate's value, the court declined to award costs for legal fees to any party.

However, the court ordered that the $53,000 disbursement for the forensic accountant's report be paid to the applicants from the estate.

Aviva appealed an arbitrator's decision in a priority dispute which found that Aviva was the priority insurer for accident benefits because it failed to prove the claimant was the 'spouse' of a driver insured by Security National.

Aviva argued the claimant and the driver were married in a foreign religious ceremony.

The Superior Court dismissed the appeal, holding that the arbitrator's decision was reasonable.

The court found that Aviva bore the burden of proof and failed to provide sufficient evidence of the date, place, or legal validity of the foreign marriage under the lex loci celebrationis.

The moving party sought partial indemnity costs of $88,608.95 plus disbursements following a successful motion to convert the responding party's application into a counterclaim in a separate action.

The court found the costs claimed to be clearly excessive and noted the moving party failed to separate the costs of the motion from the costs of the application.

Agreeing with the responding party, the court ordered that the costs of the motion be awarded in the cause, as the merits had yet to be adjudicated and the work product would be used at trial.

Fountain Asset Corp. brought an application to enforce contractual rights to share options and warrants issued by First Global Data Limited.

First Global Data defended on the basis that the options and warrants were granted as part of a financing transaction bearing a criminal rate of interest.

First Global Data brought a motion to convert the application to an action and consolidate it with a recently commenced 2017 Action.

The court granted the motion, finding that material facts were in dispute, expert evidence was required, and there was a significant risk of inconsistent verdicts if the application proceeded separately.

The claims in the application were directed to be advanced as a counterclaim in the 2017 Action.