Georgiana Masgras

The defendant brought a motion at the outset of a personal injury jury trial to preclude the plaintiff from adducing evidence contrary to a prior guilty plea for a Highway Traffic Act offence.

The plaintiff had pled guilty through a paralegal to disobeying a lane light following the motor vehicle accident.

The court held a voir dire and found that the guilty plea was not voluntary, unequivocal, or fully informed, as the plaintiff consistently maintained he had a green light and pled guilty only for convenience due to a new job.

The court dismissed the motion, ruling that permitting the plaintiff to adduce evidence to the contrary would not constitute an abuse of process.

The applicant was injured in a motor vehicle accident and sought an income replacement benefit (IRB).

The central dispute was whether the applicant was an employee or self-employed at the time of the accident, as he worked part-time as a production worker and also drove for Uber.

The Tribunal found the applicant was an employee at the time of the accident and calculated his IRB based on his gross employment income four weeks prior to the accident.

The Tribunal ordered the respondent to pay a weekly IRB of $232.96 for specified periods, plus interest.

The applicant's claim for an award under Regulation 664 for unreasonable delay was dismissed.

The plaintiffs, having settled a slip and fall claim for $7,500 after 75% contributory negligence, sought costs of over $43,000.

The defendant argued the claim was disproportionate.

The court disallowed several disbursements, including ATE insurance and various treatment costs, and significantly reduced the claimed legal fees, fixing total costs at $14,926.57.

The court also declined to intervene on the prejudgment interest calculation previously set by another judge.

The appellant appealed an arbitrator's decision awarding the insurer $6,037.84 in arbitration expenses after the appellant withdrew his FSCO application to proceed at the Licence Appeal Tribunal.

The Director's Delegate dismissed the appeal, finding that the appellant raised new issues not before the arbitrator and that there was evidence to support the arbitrator's finding that the appellant's actions prolonged, obstructed, or unnecessarily hindered the proceedings.

The applicant requested a reconsideration of a case conference decision that denied their request for the production of raw test data from the respondent's psychological IME assessor.

The applicant expanded their request to include data from two additional assessors not mentioned in the original decision.

The Tribunal denied the reconsideration request, finding that the applicant failed to specify the grounds for reconsideration under Rule 18.2 and improperly advanced new claims.

The applicant failed to make a prima facie case that the original decision contained any error meriting reconsideration.

The applicant was injured in a motor vehicle accident and received income replacement benefits (IRBs) for 104 weeks.

The respondent terminated IRBs on the basis that the applicant did not meet the post-104 week test of a complete inability to engage in any suitable employment.

The applicant applied to the Licence Appeal Tribunal for dispute resolution.

The Tribunal found the applicant's evidence regarding his pain levels to be unreliable, noting evidence of symptom exaggeration and malingering from the respondent's expert assessors.

The Tribunal concluded the applicant failed to prove he suffered a complete inability to engage in suitable employment and dismissed the claims for IRBs, interest, and a special award.

The applicant sought statutory accident benefits following a motor vehicle accident in November 2014.

At the in-person hearing before the Licence Appeal Tribunal, the applicant withdrew her claim for an award under section 10 of Ontario Regulation 664, and the parties settled all remaining issues.

The Tribunal closed the file.

The applicant sought statutory accident benefits following a motor vehicle accident.

The insurer raised preliminary issues, arguing the applicant was statute-barred from appealing the denial of income replacement benefits and physiotherapy because she missed the two-year limitation period, and that she was precluded from appealing another physiotherapy claim for failing to attend an insurer's examination.

The Tribunal extended the limitation period under section 7 of the Licence Appeal Tribunal Act, finding the applicant had a bona fide intention to appeal and the insurer suffered no material prejudice.

The Tribunal also found the applicant had attended a subsequent insurer's examination, allowing that appeal to proceed.

The applicant sought a non-earner benefit and funding for catastrophic impairment assessments following a 2011 motor vehicle accident.

The respondent denied the non-earner benefit in 2013.

The applicant appealed to the Licence Appeal Tribunal more than two years after the limitation period expired, while simultaneously pursuing arbitration at the Financial Services Commission of Ontario.

The Tribunal declined to extend the limitation period under section 7 of the Licence Appeal Tribunal Act, finding no bona fide intention to appeal to the Tribunal within the time limit, an unexplained lengthy delay, prejudice to the respondent, and a lack of merit due to surveillance evidence contradicting the applicant's claimed impairments.

The Tribunal also denied funding for the catastrophic impairment assessments, finding no reasonable basis or objective evidence to suggest the applicant might meet the catastrophic impairment threshold.

The Applicant sought to withdraw his application for arbitration at the Financial Services Commission of Ontario shortly before a rescheduled hearing, citing a desire to avoid a multiplicity of proceedings given parallel Superior Court actions.

The Insurer objected and sought its expenses.

The Arbitrator found the late withdrawal unjustified and awarded the Insurer $5,500.00 in expenses for costs thrown away, applying principles of reasonableness and consumer protection.

The applicant's lawyer brought an emergency ex parte application to enjoin a hospital from withdrawing life support from a patient.

The court initially granted the order but rescinded it the next day after the hospital and treating physician provided evidence that the patient was brain dead and the family had consented to withdrawing support.

The hospital and physician sought costs personally against the applicant's lawyer.

The court found the lawyer brought the application without instructions, submitted misleading material, and caused costs to be incurred unnecessarily.

The court ordered the lawyer to personally pay $15,000 in costs to the respondents.

The plaintiff insurer brought a motion to enforce a settlement reached during a Financial Services Commission of Ontario arbitration regarding statutory accident benefits.

The defendant insured had rescinded the settlement within two days, relying on the cooling-off period set out in section 9.1 of Ontario Regulation 664 and explicitly included in the settlement release drafted by the plaintiff.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that because the cooling-off clause was attached to and formed part of the signed settlement documentation, the defendant was entitled to rely on it to rescind the agreement.

The appellant appealed an Arbitrator's order dismissing her arbitration for Non-Earner Benefits on the basis that she failed to complete an insurer examination under s. 44 of the Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule.

The Director's Delegate allowed the appeal, finding that the Arbitrator erred by ruling that the circumstances leading to the examination were irrelevant and by failing to consider whether the examination was reasonably necessary.

The issues of entitlement to Non-Earner Benefits and a special award were remitted for a de novo re-hearing before a different Arbitrator.

The appellant was injured in a motorcycle accident and sought a determination of catastrophic impairment.

The arbitrator found the appellant had a 49% Whole Person Impairment (WPI) by only considering physical neurological impairments and excluding psychological impairments to avoid double counting.

On appeal, the Director's Delegate held that the arbitrator erred in law by failing to combine the physical and psychological impairments.

When combined, the WPI totaled 59%, exceeding the 55% threshold.

The appeal was allowed in part, declaring the appellant catastrophically impaired, while upholding the denial of attendant care benefits and a special award.

The court heard an urgent motion to vary an interlocutory order that had prohibited the withdrawal of life support for Fernando Ferreira.

Mr. Ferreira had suffered a cardiac arrest, leading to brain death.

His wife, as substitute decision-maker, and family had agreed to discontinue life support and proceed with organ donation.

An ex parte order prohibiting withdrawal of life support had been obtained by Mr. Ferreira's motor vehicle accident lawyer.

The court, treating the matter as a motion to vary, found that given the patient's brain-dead status and family consensus, the previous order should be set aside.

The application to prohibit life support withdrawal was dismissed.

The respondent requested costs following the dismissal of the applicant's request for reconsideration of a Licence Appeal Tribunal decision.

The respondent argued that the applicant's reconsideration request was unreasonable, frivolous, vexatious, and in bad faith.

The Executive Chair found that while the applicant's arguments for reconsideration were not persuasive, they did not meet the threshold of being vexatious or frivolous under Rule 19.

The request for costs was denied.

The applicant requested a reconsideration of a Licence Appeal Tribunal decision that found his injuries fell within the Minor Injury Guideline and that there was insufficient evidence to vary his income replacement benefit.

The Executive Chair denied the request, finding that the Tribunal did not mischaracterize the issues, did not err in its consideration of the evidence, and that the applicant's proposed new evidence could have reasonably been obtained prior to the original hearing.

The Applicant sought statutory accident benefits following a motor vehicle accident.

The Insurer argued that a prior settlement was binding, but the Arbitrator found the Applicant's rescission letter valid despite lacking a fax cover page.

The Arbitrator declined to recuse himself after viewing the settlement documents.

The Applicant was precluded from arbitrating her claim for non-earner benefits because she failed to attend a mandatory section 44 medical examination.

The Arbitrator also found that the Applicant's injuries fell within the Minor Injury Guideline (MIG), as there was no compelling evidence linking her seizures to the accident, and multiple medical assessors concluded her injuries were minor.

Claims for a special award and interest were dismissed, and the Applicant was ordered to pay the Insurer's reasonable expenses.

The plaintiffs' former solicitors sought leave to appeal an $800 costs order made against them personally.

The costs were awarded after the solicitors failed to notify the plaintiffs of an order removing them from the record, resulting in an unnecessary court attendance.

The court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal, finding no strong reasons to believe the motions judge exercised his discretion on the wrong principles or was plainly wrong in applying the test for awarding costs against a solicitor personally.

The Plaintiffs' former solicitors sought leave to appeal an $800 costs award made against them personally by Barnes J. The costs were awarded due to the solicitors' failure to properly serve an order removing themselves from the record, leading to an unnecessary adjournment of a summary judgment motion.

The court considered the two-part test for awarding costs against a solicitor personally, which requires a clear dereliction of duty causing unnecessary costs and the exercise of discretion sparingly and with extreme caution.

The motion for leave to appeal was dismissed, as the court found no strong grounds to believe Barnes J. erred in principle or was plainly wrong, implicitly addressing the required test.