Ian H. Gold

The applicant, Dillon Parris, commenced an application seeking the reversion of title to his former home and $80 million in damages for alleged breaches of his Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

He claimed fraud by the respondents, The Corporation of the City of Brampton and Mayor Patrick Brown, for failing to revert title and profiting from this alleged fraud.

The respondents sought dismissal of the application under Rule 2.1.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure.

The court found the application to be frivolous, vexatious, and an abuse of process, noting a lack of connection between the respondents and the applicant's loss of property or subsequent issues.

The application was dismissed.

The plaintiffs moved for summary judgment seeking a declaration that the defendant insurance broker held $475,000 in trust for them.

The funds had been wired by the plaintiffs in support of an application to establish a captive insurance company, but were returned to the defendant after the application failed.

The defendant attempted to retain the funds as an equitable set-off against the substantial debts of a third-party company, mistakenly believing the funds belonged to that third party.

The court found that the funds belonged solely to the plaintiffs and that the defendant failed to establish any basis for equitable set-off.

The motion was granted and the funds were ordered returned.

The defendants sought leave to appeal an order dismissing their motion to strike the plaintiffs' pleadings.

They argued the motion judge erred by failing to apply the doctrine of merger to strike the conspiracy claims and by applying the wrong test to the fraudulent misrepresentation claims.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion, finding the motion judge correctly declined to apply the doctrine of merger at the pleadings stage and correctly applied the test for pleading fraud.

The appellants appealed a trial judge's finding that their faulty construction of a fireplace caused a fire in the respondent's home.

The appellants argued the trial judge misapprehended the evidence and failed to consider that the fire's cause was undetermined.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the trial judge's acceptance of the respondent's expert evidence that the fire was caused by pyrolysis due to the chimney's proximity to a trimmer joist.