John Villella v. Corporation of the City of Brampton and Susan Bauman, 2011 HRTO 1085

HUMAN RIGHTS TRIBUNAL OF ONTARIO

B E T W E E N:

John Villella

Applicant

-and-

Corporation of the City of Brampton and Susan Bauman

Respondents

decision

Adjudicator: Faisal Bhabha

Date: June 9, 2011

Citation: 2011 HRTO 1085

Indexed as: Villella v. Brampton (City)

1The applicant filed an Application on August 28, 2009 under section 34 of Part IV of the Human Rights Code, R.S.O. 1990, c. H.19, as amended (the “Code”). The Application alleges discrimination in the areas of goods, services and facilities on the basis of ancestry, ethnic origin, sex and family status.

2In a Case Assessment Direction, dated August 16, 2010, the Tribunal directed that the matter be scheduled for a summary hearing by way of teleconference, pursuant to Rule 19A of the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure, in order to determine whether the Application has a reasonable prospect of success. The summary hearing took place on March 29, 2011.

ANALYSIS AND DECISION

3Rule 19A.1 reads as follows:

19A.1 The Tribunal may hold a summary hearing, on its own initiative or at the request of a party, on the question of whether an Application should be dismissed in whole or in part on the basis that there is no reasonable prospect that the Application or part of the Application will succeed.

4In Dabic v. Windsor Police Service, 2010 HRTO 1994, at paras. 7-9, the Tribunal made the following observations on the type of inquiry that may be involved in a summary hearing:

A summary hearing is generally ordered at an early stage in the process. In some cases, the respondent may not have been required to provide a response. In others, the respondent may have responded but disclosure of all arguably relevant documents and the preparation of witness statements, which generally occur following the Notice of Hearing, will not yet have happened.

In some cases, the issue at the summary hearing may be whether, assuming all the allegations in the application to be true, it has a reasonable prospect of success. In these cases, the focus will generally be on the legal analysis and whether what the applicant alleges may be reasonably considered to amount to a Code violation.

In other cases, the focus of the summary hearing may be on whether there is a reasonable prospect that the applicant can prove, on a balance of probabilities, that his or her Code rights were violated. Often, such cases will deal with whether the applicant can show a link between an event and the grounds upon which he or she makes the claim. The issue will be whether there is a reasonable prospect that evidence the applicant has or that is reasonably available to him or her can show a link between the event and the alleged prohibited ground.

5In this case, the applicant makes three broad allegations. First, he alleges that he was discriminated against by court staff with respect to scheduling his son’s trial in which he was acting as his son’s representative. Secondly, he alleges that he was discriminated against by the personal respondent, a Crown prosecutor, who failed to produce Crown disclosure in his son’s case. Finally, he alleges that the personal respondent acted in a discriminatory manner by lying to him and to the court regarding disclosure in his son’s matter.

6The respondents take the position that the second and third of these issues are beyond the jurisdiction of the Tribunal by reason of prosecutorial immunity, citing the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Krieger v. Law Society of Alberta, 2002 SCC 65, [2002] 3 S.C.R. 372. Alternatively, the respondents argue that the applicant has failed to make any allegations that could give rise to a finding that the Code was breached. Moreover, they argue that the “services” at issue were provided to the applicant’s son, not to the applicant, and therefore urge the Tribunal to dismiss the Application on the basis that the wrong party is litigating.

7The applicant believes that he and members of his family have been treated poorly in Brampton court based on a perception that they appear frequently before that court. He believes that he, as his son’s representative, was deliberately caused difficulty scheduling a trial date by court staff, and then was denied disclosure and lied to in open court by the Crown prosecutor. He alleges that this discriminatory treatment is based on ill-will towards his family and towards their Italian ethnic origin. He relies on unsubstantiated claims that other members of his family and other people of Italian descent have also complained about unfair treatment at the court.

8I find that the Application does not have a reasonable prospect of success. The applicant does not allege any facts that could give rise to a finding of Code-based discrimination. His principal grievance is with customer care and service quality at the court. Other than a bald assertion that because he and other members of his family are of Italian origin and they allegedly have experienced poor service at the court, there are no additional facts or allegations which, if accepted as true, provide the necessary nexus between the impugned conduct and Code grounds.

9The Code is concerned with substantive discrimination. As stated in C.M. v. York Region District School Board, 2010 HRTO 1494 at para. 4, the Code does not aim to eliminate all differences in treatment, but rather discrimination, in the form of disadvantage, prejudice and stereotyping, on the grounds set out in the Code: see generally Andrews v. Law Society of British Columbia, 1989 CanLII 2 (SCC), [1989] 1 S.C.R. 143 at p. 174; R. v. Kapp, 2008 SCC 41 ; Ontario (Disability Support Program) v. Tranchemontagne, 2010 ONCA 593 at paras. 80-84.

10The Code is not designed to remedy all instances of differential treatment, poor service delivery or professional misconduct. The alleged treatment must be linked in a substantive way to a Code ground. The applicant must show more than mere subjective suspicion to establish a link between the respondent’s alleged conduct and the grounds pleaded. There must be at least some objective facts and circumstances to support the theory linking the respondents’ action with the Code. Here, I do not see that the applicant has alleged any facts that would be capable of establishing such a link.

11Accordingly, I find that this Application has no reasonable prospect of success and it is dismissed.