Harold Niman

Following a motion for temporary child support, the party seeking costs sought full indemnity costs.

The court found that the opposing party had behaved unreasonably by failing to provide evidence of current income, making irrelevant submissions, and failing to accept a reasonable offer to settle.

The court awarded full indemnity costs in the amount of $19,924.73.

The moving party sought leave to appeal an order of Kiteley J. dated December 10, 2020.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal.

Costs were awarded to the corporate respondents in the fixed amount of $5,000, while no costs were awarded to the individual respondent as no costs outline was filed.

The moving party sought leave to appeal a February 17, 2021 decision regarding interim spousal support.

The Divisional Court granted leave to appeal on three specific issues: whether the motion judge erred by ordering a net amount of spousal support contrary to the Income Tax Act, whether a material change in circumstances was required to vary an interim without prejudice order, and whether the motion judge relied on irrelevant considerations or made palpable and overriding errors in determining the temporary spousal support amount.

Costs of $5,000 were awarded to the moving party.

The moving party sought leave to appeal a lower court decision dated May 21, 2021.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal in writing and ordered the moving party to pay costs of $3,600 to the responding party.

On a family law motion, the moving party sought temporary spousal support, temporary child support, and security following the breakdown of a long marriage with one economically dependent spouse and one high-income payor.

The court held that the moving party established prima facie entitlement to interim spousal support under s. 15.2 of the Divorce Act, declined to conduct a detailed imputation analysis on the motion, accepted the recipient's actual income, and fixed the payor's income at $508,000 for temporary support purposes.

The court ordered child support of $3,000 monthly retroactive to January 1, 2020, and spousal support retroactive only to August 1, 2020, rejecting claims for set-off based on expenses and declining to adjust support for cross-border tax consequences without expert evidence.

A support deduction order was directed to issue.

The court determined costs following a case conference, a preservation motion, and a jurisdiction motion in a family law proceeding.

The respondent sought full indemnity costs, while the applicant argued he should not pay costs and sought his own costs, alleging bad faith by the respondent.

The court found that the applicant had acted in bad faith and abused the court's process by deceiving the court about his reasons for an adjournment.

The court awarded the respondent partial indemnity costs for the case conference, substantial indemnity costs for the preservation motion, and full indemnity costs for the jurisdiction motion, totaling $35,532.87.

The respondent mother brought a motion for temporary and retroactive child support and section 7 expenses.

The applicant father, a high-income physician who relocated to the United States, argued that the Federal Child Support Guidelines should not apply because the children reside in Tennessee where the cost of living is lower, and his income exceeds $150,000.

The court rejected these arguments, finding the Guidelines applied and the table amount was appropriate.

The court imputed the father's income at over $716,000 for 2020 and 2021 due to his failure to provide reliable current income information.

The father was ordered to pay $8,874 per month in ongoing child support, 72.3% of ongoing section 7 expenses, and over $234,000 in retroactive support and expenses.

The applicant brought a motion for leave to appeal an interim order.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs of $5,000 to the corporate respondents.

The parties made written submissions regarding costs following two motions: the applicant's motion for interim spousal support and the respondent's motion regarding mortgages on the matrimonial home.

The court noted that neither party succeeded on their own motion, resulting in divided success.

The applicant's offer to settle was not considered a better outcome than the status quo maintained by the court's order.

Applying the principles of costs under Rule 24 of the Family Law Rules and section 131 of the Courts of Justice Act, the court exercised its discretion to award no costs to either party, ordering each to bear their own costs.

Following an appeal of a family law arbitration award where success was divided, both parties sought costs of the appeal.

The applicant sought $70,000 and the respondent sought $111,734.71.

The court reviewed the principles of costs under the Family Law Rules, including the impact of offers to settle and divided success.

Finding that neither party was predominantly successful and neither acted unreasonably or in bad faith, the court ordered that each party bear their own costs of the appeal.

The court also reduced the costs of the arbitration payable by the applicant to the respondent from $75,000 to $49,150 to reflect the appellate outcome.

The parties separated after eight years of marriage and have one child with Type 1 diabetes.

Both parties brought motions for interim relief regarding parenting, support, and the matrimonial home.

The court ordered joint decision-making and a graduated parenting schedule leading to equal time.

For support purposes, the court imputed an income of $25,000 to the applicant and determined the respondent's income at $1,192,666 based on a three-year average, excluding certain non-recurring amounts.

The court ordered interim child and spousal support, the sale of the matrimonial home, and an advance of $120,000 to the applicant for interim disbursements.

The applicant sought costs following a successful motion for interim spousal support and disclosure of cryptocurrency holdings.

The court reviewed the parties' offers to settle and found the applicant beat her offer regarding spousal support and met her offer regarding native file format disclosure.

The applicant was awarded costs of $104,533 on a substantial recovery basis.

The corporate respondents were successful on a discrete issue regarding a server and were awarded costs of $12,600 on a partial indemnity basis, to be paid from the applicant's costs award.

The applicant brought a motion seeking production of a lawyer's file, arguing she had an explicit or implicit solicitor-client relationship with him, or alternatively, that the respondents waived privilege.

The lawyer had acted for the respondent and the corporate respondents during a period when the parties were allegedly involved in a joint family venture involving cryptocurrency.

The court found the applicant failed to establish a solicitor-client relationship, as the few documents she relied on were insufficient to show she was led to believe he was her lawyer.

The court also found no evidence that the respondents waived privilege.

Although the motion was dismissed, the court struck significant portions of the respondent's affidavit for relying on inadmissible hearsay in breach of the Family Law Rules.

The Respondent sought a pre-trial ruling to preclude the Applicant from raising issues related to the ownership, control, or valuation of certain companies (FCMC Companies) at trial.

The Respondent argued irrelevance, abuse of process due to a parallel civil action, issue estoppel from a prior disclosure motion, lack of necessary parties, and insufficient pleadings.

The court dismissed the Respondent's motion, finding the Applicant's claims relevant to net family property and support, no abuse of process as the legal issues differed from the civil action, no issue estoppel as the prior ruling was on disclosure, and no preclusion due to non-joinder of parties or insufficient pleadings, as the Respondent had clear notice of the issues.

The applicant, Carmela Maria Capone, moved to quash the appeal of the respondent, Zoran Fotak, from two interlocutory orders made in ongoing family law proceedings.

The motion judge had ordered the respondent to bring a stay motion as a condition for his jurisdictional challenge to be heard, clarifying that no decision on the merits of the jurisdictional challenge had been made.

The Court of Appeal found the orders to be interlocutory and not appealable, as they did not determine any substantive claim or defence.

Consequently, the appeal was quashed.

This endorsement addresses procedural issues arising from a prior order in a family law matter concerning child support.

The court clarifies the scope of motions, enforces strict filing limits, and dismisses numerous requests for disclosure and questioning as premature or outside the established timetable.

The judge emphasizes adherence to previous directions and the Notice to the Profession, aiming to streamline the proceedings for the temporary child support motion.

The applicant sought interim spousal support and security for support.

The respondent sought orders regarding the renewal of a first mortgage and the registration of a proposed second mortgage on the matrimonial home, and characterization of payments.

The court determined the respondent's income for support purposes, attributed some pre-tax corporate income, and set a spousal support range.

However, no periodic spousal support order was made as long as the respondent continued to pay the applicant's salary and benefits and maintain matrimonial home expenses.

The respondent's motion to register a second mortgage was dismissed due to lack of jurisdiction under the Family Law Act for jointly owned property.

The court preserved the respondent's right to seek credit for matrimonial home expenses at trial.

The appellant husband appealed an arbitrator's award dismissing his claim to a 50 percent beneficial ownership interest in the matrimonial home.

The husband had transferred his jointly-held interest in the home to the respondent wife to protect it from potential creditors.

The arbitrator found the transfer was a gift, not a resulting trust.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding the arbitrator correctly applied the presumption of resulting trust, properly considered the husband's intention to defeat creditors, and made no palpable and overriding error in concluding the husband intended to gift his interest and divested himself of control over the property.

The parties appealed an arbitrator's award regarding financial issues following their separation.

The central issues involved the calculation of the respondent's equalization payment, including the treatment of inherited properties and title to the matrimonial home, as well as the calculation of his income for spousal and child support purposes.

The Superior Court of Justice found that the arbitrator erred in allowing the respondent to claim sole ownership of the matrimonial home, applying the doctrines of issue estoppel and res judicata based on a prior consent award for its sale.

The court also corrected the arbitrator's calculation of the respondent's income for support purposes, but otherwise dismissed the appeals regarding the treatment of inherited property, spousal support duration, and prejudgment interest.

The appellant appealed a spousal support order of $125,000 per month following a 24-year marriage.

The appellant argued the trial judge erred in assessing the respondent's needs and means, misapplied the Halliwell principle for high-income earners, and erred in awarding indefinite support.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the trial judge's assessment of the respondent's compensatory entitlement, needs, and means, and confirming that the trial judge properly conducted an individualized fact-specific analysis.