HUMAN RIGHTS TRIBUNAL OF ONTARIO
B E T W E E N:
Félix Amazan
Applicant
-and-
Toronto Catholic District School Board, Norma Rios, and Sylvie Talarico
Respondents
INTERIM DECISION
Adjudicator: Douglas Sanderson
Indexed as: Amazan v. Toronto Catholic District School Board
WRITTEN SUBMISSIONS
Felix Amazan, Applicant
Self-represented
Toronto Catholic District School Board, Norma Rios, and Sylvie Talarico, Respondents
No one appearing
Toronto Police Services Board, Affected Party
No one appearing
1This Application, filed under the Human Rights Code, R.S.O. 1990, c. H.19, as amended (the “Code”), alleges discrimination with respect to employment because of race, colour, ancestry, place of origin and ethnic origin. The hearing of this matter is scheduled for September 8 and 9, 2016.
2The applicant is an elementary school teacher employed by the respondent school board (the “Board”). Following a summary hearing, the Tribunal dismissed all but one of the applicant’s allegations. See 2014 HRTO 751. The Application continues against the remaining respondents regarding an incident that occurred on March 6, 2013 between the applicant and the individual respondent Norma Rios. Ms. Rios reported the incident to the police and the applicant was charged with a criminal offence. The charge was later withdrawn.
3On July 25, 2016, the applicant filed a Request for an Order During Proceedings seeking to add several people as individual respondents to this Application (the “Request”). Neither the respondents nor the proposed respondents responded to the Request and the time for doing so has passed. The Toronto Police Services Board, an affected party, filed a Request for an Order During Proceedings on August 17, 2016 which, amongst other things, addresses the applicant’s Request, but the deadline for responding to that request has not passed. For the following reasons the Request is dismissed.
4The applicant seeks to add the following people to the Application as individual respondents: Maria Rizzo, Angela Gauthier, Peter Bernotas, Rory McGuckin, John Shain, Corrado Maltese, Detective Lynn Beveridge and Detective Marilyn Frank.
5The applicant submitted that he “identified” that the proposed respondents discriminated against him, contrary to sections 5 and 9 of the Code and that they made a false complaint of assault against him to the police. The applicant submitted that Detective Beveridge asked Ms. Talarico, an individual respondent, to convince Ms. Rios, the other individual respondent, to make a false complaint against the applicant. The applicant submitted that Detectives Beveridge and Frank arrested him without just cause.
Analysis and Decision
6The Tribunal held in Smyth v. Toronto Police Services, 2009 HRTO 1513, that when determining a request to add a respondent, the Tribunal should consider the following three questions:
(1) Are there allegations made that could support a finding that the proposed respondent violated the Code?
(2) If the proposed respondent is an individual and an organization is also named, is there a compelling reason to include him or her as a respondent?
(3) Would it be fair, in all the circumstances, to add the proposed respondent?
The application of the first stage involves considering whether there are allegations made in the Application that could lead to a finding that the proposed respondent violated the Code. At the second stage, the Tribunal applies the factors set out in Persaud v. Toronto District School Board, 2008 HRTO 31 at paragraph 5, which focus principally on whether there is an organization that is part of the proceeding, which is able to take responsibility for the conduct, and whether the conduct of the individual respondent is a central issue in the proceedings. The factors from Persaud, above, are applicable to both requests to add individual respondents and requests to remove them. At the third stage, the Tribunal may consider a variety of factors, including the effects on the hearing process of adding the proposed respondent, the reasons the proposed respondent was not named in the Application or Response, and prejudice to the other parties.
7To begin with, the allegations against Mr. Bernotas, Mr. Shain and Mr. Maltese in this Application were dismissed in 2014 HRTO 751. The applicant repeated his allegations against these three individuals in two subsequent applications dealing with the same events: 2015-21315-I and 2015-21393-I. The applicant alleged that Detective Beveridge discriminated against him regarding the investigation of the March 6, 2013 incident in application 2015-21315-I. The Tribunal dismissed the allegations against Messrs. Bernotas, Shain and Maltese, pursuant to section 45.1 of the Code because the allegations had been appropriately dealt with in another proceeding (i.e., the Tribunal’s summary hearing in this matter). The Tribunal dismissed the allegations against Detective Beveridge related to the incident in March 2013 for delay. See Amazan v. Toronto Catholic District School Board, 2016 HRTO 218, reconsideration denied 2016 HRTO 499. Consequently, the Tribunal has considered and dismissed these allegations against these proposed respondents. Other than reiterate that he believes these individuals discriminated against him, the applicant provided no basis to revisit the Tribunal’s decisions and the time for reconsideration has long since passed.
8The applicant’s submissions that the proposed respondents discriminated against him is no more than a bald assertion. There are no allegations at all against Ms. Rizzo, Ms. Gauthier, Mr. McGuckin, and Detectives Beveridge and Frank in this Application. As noted, the allegations against the other proposed respondents have been dismissed. Consequently, there are no allegations that could support a finding of discrimination against any of the proposed respondents. The actions of the proposed respondents are simply not in issue in this Application.
9The hearing of this Application is scheduled to commence in approximately two weeks. In these circumstances, it would also be unfair to add the proposed respondents at this point in the proceedings.
Pre-Hearing Disclosure
10In a recent Interim Decision in this matter, 2016 HRTO 971, dated July 22, 2016, the Tribunal directed the respondents to comply with their obligations under Rule 16.1 of the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure (the “Rules”) to disclose arguably relevant documents. As of the date of this Interim Decision the respondents have not complied with this direction. As of the date of this Interim Decision, none of the parties have complied with their pre-hearing disclosure obligations pursuant to Rules 16.2, 16.3, 17.1 and 17.2 of the Rules, the deadline for which was July 25, 2016. There are serious consequences for this case if the parties do not comply with their obligations under the Tribunal’s Rules, as set out below.
Order
11The Tribunal orders as follows:
The Request to add the proposed respondents is denied;
The respondents shall immediately comply with their obligations under Rule 16.1;
By no later than September 1, 2016, the parties must deliver to each other and file with the Tribunal the documents they intends to rely upon at the hearing, a list of their witnesses and a brief statement describing what their witnesses will say when they testify (Rule 16.2, 16.3, 17.1 and 17.2);
If the parties do not provide the above-noted materials by September 1, 2016, the Tribunal may take any or all of the steps set out in Rule 5 of the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure, including not permitting them to call any witnesses or present any documentary evidence at the hearing.
Dated at Toronto, this 25th day of August, 2016.
“Signed By”
Douglas Sanderson
Vice-chair