Jean L. MacFarland

The appellant appealed an order striking his pleadings and permitting an uncontested trial.

The appellant had repeatedly failed to comply with multiple court orders requiring financial disclosure, payment of support arrears, and payment of costs over an extended period.

Despite numerous opportunities and extensions granted by various judges, the appellant continued to be non-compliant.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no error in the lower court's decision to strike the pleadings given the appellant's persistent and egregious pattern of non-compliance with court orders.

An appeal from a Registrar in Bankruptcy's order denying an absolute discharge and imposing a condition requiring payment of $61,000 as a prerequisite to discharge.

The appellant, an electrician who became bankrupt following an acrimonious divorce, received settlement funds but could not account for their disposition due to severe mental health issues including clinical depression and dissociative identity disorder.

The appeal judge refused to admit fresh psychiatric evidence.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, admitted the psychiatric evidence, found the Registrar made a factual error regarding non-disclosure of a Polish property, and concluded the $61,000 condition was unreasonable given the appellant's mental health circumstances.

The court granted an absolute discharge.

The applicant, a nurse employed by a hospital, was sued for invasion of privacy after she repeatedly accessed a patient's private hospital records without authorization and without being involved in the patient's care.

The insurance carriers appealed a lower court decision requiring them to defend the nurse under a commercial general liability policy.

The Court of Appeal upheld the lower court's decision, finding that the policy language covering invasion of privacy, including intrusion upon seclusion, clearly applied to the unauthorized access to medical records.

The court held that such conduct arose from the hospital's operations and fell within the scope of coverage intended by the policy.

Electricity ratepayers brought an action seeking damages and declaratory relief concerning the sale of shares in Hydro One, alleging that the Premier and Ministers acted in bad faith to reward political donors and obtain further donations to the Ontario Liberal Party.

The motion judge struck out the claim under Rule 21, finding it was not justiciable as it concerned core policy and the pleadings were inadequate to support an inference of bad faith.

The appellants appealed, arguing the motion judge erred in assessing the facts in isolation, misconstruing material facts, and failing to accept pleaded facts as true.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the appellants' allegations were insufficient to plead bad faith and that accepting such a pleading would undermine the immunity afforded to core policy decisions.

The appellant, a distributor of the respondent's product, appealed a summary judgment awarding the respondent payment for goods sold and delivered in the amount of $47,301.92 USD plus interest and costs.

The appellant raised defences of waiver and failure to mitigate, claiming the respondent had allegedly agreed to take back unrelated product ordered years prior.

The Court of Appeal found no factual foundation for either defence and upheld the summary judgment.

The court also rejected the appellant's challenge to the costs award on a substantial indemnity basis, finding the offer to settle complied with applicable rules.

The appellant was convicted on 16 of 17 charges including exercising control, procuring, receiving material benefit from procuring, sexual assault, robbery, theft under $5,000, fraud under $5,000, uttering threats, and assault.

He was sentenced to 8.5 years imprisonment less 3 years pre-trial custody.

On appeal, the appellant challenged his conviction and sought leave to appeal his sentence.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge's credibility findings were open on the record, that the similar fact evidence was properly admitted, and that the sentence was not demonstrably unfit.

The appeal from conviction was dismissed and leave to appeal sentence was granted but the sentence appeal was also dismissed.

The appellant, the only son of the deceased, appealed an order by the application judge that the deceased did not create a life interest in the family home in his favour.

The deceased's will expressed a wish that the son use the family home as his home "for as long as he wishes," but also provided that the home be transferred to his three children jointly.

The appellant lived in the home but failed to maintain it, resulting in disrepair and tax arrears.

The application judge concluded that the deceased did not intend to create a life interest and ordered the home sold.

The Court of Appeal found no palpable and overriding error and dismissed the appeal.

Appeal from a trial judgment dismissing the appellant's action for misuse of confidential information and spoliation.

The appellant alleged that the respondent West Face Capital Inc. improperly obtained and used confidential information about the appellant's bid to acquire WIND Mobile Inc., allegedly obtained from a former employee who moved to West Face.

The trial judge dismissed all claims, finding that the appellant failed to prove that confidential information was provided to West Face or that any such information was used in West Face's successful competing bid.

The trial judge also found that the appellant's choice to terminate negotiations due to a break fee demand, rather than West Face's competing bid, caused the failure of the appellant's acquisition.

The Court of Appeal upheld the trial judgment and dismissed the appeal, as well as the application for leave to appeal the costs orders.

The appellant appealed an order of the Superior Court of Justice dated October 20, 2017.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the motion judge's reasons and dismissed the appeal.

Costs were awarded to the respondent in the sum of $15,000 on a partial indemnity basis inclusive of disbursements and HST.

The appellants appealed a summary judgment granted by the Superior Court in favor of the respondent bank.

The appellants had fallen into arrears on property taxes, and the bank paid those arrears as permitted under the mortgage terms and added the amount to the mortgage debt.

This caused the appellants to exceed their authorized credit limit, constituting a default under the mortgage.

The appellants filed fresh evidence on appeal that could have been presented at the motion stage.

The court found no basis for the defences raised and dismissed the appeal, awarding costs to the respondent.

The appellant, a distributor of the respondent's products, appealed a summary judgment that dismissed its action and granted judgment on the respondent's counterclaim for approximately $430,000 in unpaid product purchases.

The motion judge found that the respondent properly terminated the distribution agreement based on the appellant's breach, including failure to honour customer orders and circulation of disparaging letters about the respondent.

The Court of Appeal upheld the summary judgment, finding no genuine issue for trial and rejecting the appellant's allegations of misuse of confidential information and interference with contractual relations.

The respondent brought an unsuccessful motion for reconsideration in writing.

The court awarded costs to the responding parties, rejecting the moving party's argument that costs should be modest because the motion was made in writing.

The court found that the 18.6 hours spent by counsel responding to the motion was reasonable, as the motion required a review of materials filed on the appeal and arguments made at the hearing.

Costs were fixed at $8,249, inclusive of disbursements and HST.

A condominium corporation issued a clean status certificate to the respondent when he purchased a unit in 2013.

When the respondent requested a new status certificate in 2016 to market the unit for sale, the corporation noted that the unit layout had been altered without Board consent, contrary to the declaration.

The respondent sought a declaration that the corporation was estopped from noting such matters in the subsequent certificate.

The application judge granted the relief sought, finding the corporation bound by its earlier clean certificate.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that while the corporation is bound by its earlier certificate as against the original purchaser, it is not estopped from disclosing newly discovered matters in subsequent certificates.

The corporation's obligation to disclose material information to prospective purchasers overrides any estoppel argument.

The respondent brought a motion to quash an appeal on the ground that the order under appeal was interlocutory and not final, placing it outside the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeal.

The order arose from ongoing family law proceedings and required the appellant to make monthly spousal and child support payments, with a provision allowing the respondent to strike the appellant's pleadings on financial issues if payments were not made.

The appellant argued he could not pay and that the consequence clause created a "catch 22" preventing his participation in ongoing proceedings.

The Court of Appeal held that the order was interlocutory and quashed the appeal, finding the jurisdictional issue was plain and obvious.

The appellant, a commercial condominium unit owner, sought to amend the condominium declaration to allow its employees access to recreational common elements (swimming pool, gymnasium, library, squash court) that were restricted to dwelling unit holders and their guests.

The application judge dismissed the application, holding that restrictions on the use of common elements need not be listed in Schedule F of the declaration under the Condominium Act.

The Court of Appeal affirmed, finding no error in the application judge's interpretation of the statutory provisions or his use of the zoning by-law to explain the declaration's proper interpretation.

The appellant was convicted of manslaughter and break and enter following his participation in a home invasion during which another participant stabbed and killed a man.

On appeal, the appellant challenged the voluntariness of his statement to police, arguing that the interviewing officer's repeated inducements and threats rendered the confession involuntary.

The application judge had found the statement voluntary, concluding there was no quid pro quo because police made no explicit promises of assistance.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the application judge erred by applying too narrow a conception of inducements and threats.

The court held that the officer's veiled inducements of decreased jeopardy for speaking and threats of increased jeopardy for silence constituted an implicit quid pro quo.

Considering the appellant's age, Aboriginal background, repeated assertions of the right to silence, and the coercive nature of the interrogation, the court concluded the statement was not voluntarily made and ordered a new trial.

The appellants appealed a motion judge's decision regarding their right of access to waterfront property through membership in Cedar Ridge Waterfront Park Corporation (CRRC).

The motion judge found a common intention that lot purchasers would have water access through CRRC membership.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that the right of access was contractual in nature, not an easement or easement by estoppel.

The court found that the documentation and circumstances were inconsistent with the creation of an easement, including the requirement to assign membership to subsequent purchasers and the absence of typical easement indicia such as metes and bounds descriptions.

The appellant appealed his committal for extradition to the United States and sought judicial review of the Minister of Justice's surrender order.

The appellant was committed on charges of fraud and possession of property obtained by crime related to his management of a pharmaceutical business that sold drugs to U.S. doctors and clinics without complying with American regulatory requirements.

The Minister surrendered the appellant on charges of conspiracy and unlicensed distribution of prescription drugs rather than fraud.

The appellant challenged the process as unfair, arguing he lacked opportunity to respond to conspiracy allegations and that there was insufficient evidence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the committal judge lacked jurisdiction to compel disclosure of anonymous witness identities, the evidence supported the possession charge satisfying double criminality requirements, and the Minister had broad discretion under the Extradition Act to describe the offence as the Minister saw fit.

The appellant was convicted of robbery and failing to remain at the scene of an accident arising from a carjacking on May 24, 2016 in Ottawa.

The case turned on identity.

The victim testified that the appellant was not the man who attacked him, providing confused and unconvincing evidence about a prior high school connection and a bar encounter.

The trial judge rejected the victim's testimony as unreliable and hazy, and instead relied on video evidence, testimony from the Brown brothers, and DNA evidence to find the appellant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding no error in the trial judge's findings and that the verdict was amply supported by the evidentiary record.

The appellant appealed his conviction for sexual assault entered by the Ontario Court of Justice.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge erred by reversing the onus of proof, requiring the appellant to explain bruises on the complainant when he had no such obligation.

The court also found that fresh evidence in the form of a CFS report on a penile swab, which showed no female DNA present, was of sufficient cogency to affect the verdict.

The conviction was set aside and a new trial was ordered.