John Norris

Following a judgment allowing the application for judicial review and setting aside the decision to revoke the applicant's Canadian citizenship, the Court sought submissions on whether a serious question of general importance should be certified.

The parties agreed that no such question arose, and the Court was satisfied that no question of general importance warranted certification.

The applicant, who has significant mental health challenges, sought an urgent stay of her scheduled removal to Nigeria pending her application for judicial review of a decision refusing a 60-day deferral of removal.

The applicant had failed to appear for her removal previously, raising the clean hands doctrine.

The Court held that the clean hands doctrine should be considered within the balance of convenience portion of the stay test.

The Court found a serious question existed regarding whether the officer's reliance on unspecified reception arrangements being made in Nigeria was reasonable or fair.

Irreparable harm was established due to the risk of psychological damage and the loss of a meaningful remedy if the applicant were removed.

The balance of convenience favoured the applicant, mitigating her prior non-compliance due to her mental health.

The motion for a stay of removal was granted.

The Minister sought a stay of an Immigration Division order releasing the respondent from detention, pending an application for leave and judicial review.

The respondent had a history of non-compliance with removal orders and significant mental health challenges, including suicidal ideation.

The Federal Court granted the stay, finding the Minister met the RJR-MacDonald test.

The Court found a serious issue regarding the unreasonableness of the finding that the bondsperson would be effective, irreparable harm due to the real probability of failure to report for removal, and that the balance of convenience favoured continuing detention given the lack of community supports.

The defendants were previously found in civil contempt of an interlocutory injunction prohibiting the sale of set-top boxes that provided unauthorized access to the plaintiffs' television programming.

In this sentencing decision, the Federal Court rejected the plaintiffs' requests for a 90-day jail sentence and a $200,000 fine, finding them manifestly excessive.

Instead, considering the scale of the operation, the defendants' delayed apology, and comparable cases, the Court imposed a fine of $40,000 payable over 24 months, backed by the threat of imprisonment for default, and awarded $35,000 in costs.

The applicant, a citizen of India facing deportation due to criminality, sought to stay his removal pending the judicial review of his negative pre-removal risk assessment (PRRA).

He argued he would face risks from his uncle and the military in India, as well as risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Federal Court dismissed the motion, finding the applicant failed to establish a real risk of irreparable harm.

The alleged risks from his uncle and the military were found to be speculative, and the applicant did not provide personalized evidence demonstrating that returning to India during the pandemic would put him at a real risk of irreparable harm, especially considering he was fully vaccinated.

The applicant sought judicial review of a decision by the Refugee Appeal Division confirming the rejection of his refugee claim.

The claim was based on alleged persecution due to his political involvement.

The RPD rejected the claim primarily on adverse credibility grounds, including the submission of fraudulent documents.

The applicant challenged the RAD's refusal to admit new evidence, its assessment of the interpretation quality at the RPD, and the adverse credibility determination.

The Federal Court found the RAD's decision reasonable in all respects and dismissed the application.

The applicant, an Afghan national living in Pakistan, applied for permanent residence under the family class, requesting an exemption on humanitarian and compassionate (H&C) grounds because his Canadian sister was ineligible to sponsor him.

A Migration Officer refused the application, citing the applicant's ineligibility under the family class as a factor weighing against granting H&C relief.

The Federal Court found this decision unreasonable because treating the ineligibility that necessitates H&C relief as a reason to deny it fundamentally misunderstands subsection 25(1) of the IRPA.

The application for judicial review was allowed and the matter remitted for reconsideration.

The applicants, a married couple from Turkey, were granted refugee protection in Canada in 2006.

The Minister applied to cease Ms. Ede's protection due to her returning to Turkey with a renewed passport, and to vacate Mr. Ede's protection alleging he misrepresented his criminal record by hiding a drug smuggling charge.

The Refugee Protection Division (RPD) ceased Ms. Ede's status and vacated Mr. Ede's.

On judicial review, the Federal Court upheld the cessation of Ms. Ede's protection, finding it was reasonable to conclude she intended to reavail herself of Turkey's protection.

However, the Court allowed Mr. Ede's application, ruling the RPD's adverse credibility findings and conclusion that he knew he was charged with an offence when he applied for protection were unreasonable.

The applicant sought judicial review of a decision rejecting her pre-removal risk assessment (PRRA).

She feared returning to Saint Lucia because of her abusive former spouse.

The PRRA officer rejected the application finding insufficient evidence of personalized risk and that state protection was available in Saint Lucia.

Although the applicant had evaded removal for years, the Court declined to dismiss the application on clean hands grounds alone.

However, on the merits, while the officer made errors in assessing a Family Court Protection Order and affidavits from the applicant's children, the decision was still reasonable because the officer's conclusion on state protection was sound.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The respondents in an application under section 38 of the Canada Evidence Act brought a motion for a publication ban and confidentiality order regarding a public hearing.

The Court found it had authority to grant a publication ban based on its inherent powers and a confidentiality order under Rule 151.

Applying the Sherman Estate test, the Court found the orders were necessary to prevent serious risks to trial fairness and prior publication bans, and that the benefits outweighed the negative effects.

The applicant, who was inadmissible due to serious criminality, moved for a stay of his removal to Nigeria pending the determination of his application for leave and judicial review of the refusal of his permanent residence application on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

The Court granted the motion, finding that the applicant met the tripartite test for an interlocutory stay of removal.

The underlying application raised a serious issue regarding the procedural fairness of the officer's best interests of the child assessment.

Removal before the judicial review was determined would cause irreparable harm by depriving the applicant of a meaningful remedy.

The balance of convenience favored the applicant, as the public interest in his immediate removal was modest given he had previously been granted temporary resident permits despite his criminal inadmissibility.

The applicants, a Nigerian family, sought judicial review of a decision by the Refugee Appeal Division (RAD) rejecting their claim for refugee protection on the basis of a viable internal flight alternative (IFA) in Abeokuta, Nigeria.

The applicants argued the RAD erred in its standard of proof for the IFA and unduly relied on a revoked Jurisprudential Guide.

The Federal Court found the RAD's decision reasonable, confirming the RAD correctly applied the balance of probabilities standard and appropriately used the Jurisprudential Guide's analytical framework based on the specific evidence of the case.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The applicants, a mother and her minor daughter from Nigeria, sought judicial review of a Refugee Appeal Division (RAD) decision affirming the denial of their refugee claims.

The claims were based on fear of agents of persecution seeking to subject them to ritual purification.

The RAD found they had a viable Internal Flight Alternative (IFA) in Abuja.

The Federal Court held the RAD's decision was reasonable, as the RAD appropriately assessed the evidence regarding the agents' ability and motivation to locate the applicants in the IFA and the reasonableness of relocating there.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The applicant, a public servant, filed a harassment complaint against two senior CBSA labour relations officials.

The CBSA Vice-President determined the conduct did not meet the definition of workplace harassment and declined to investigate.

The applicant's subsequent grievance of this decision was denied.

On judicial review, the Federal Court found the decision denying the grievance reasonable, holding that the conduct complained of clearly fell outside the policy definition of harassment.

Although the decision maker erred by failing to address the applicant's concerns about lack of impartiality in the process, the Court held this did not justify overturning the decision because the same outcome was inevitable.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The Crown moved to stay the self-represented plaintiff's claims relating to administrative segregation and Charter violations, arguing overlap with a pending class action and human rights complaint.

The Crown also sought to strike sexual harassment claims.

The Court dismissed the motion, finding it was not in the interests of justice to stay the claims and that the material facts pleaded could support recognized torts.

The applicant sought judicial review of a Canada Revenue Agency decision denying his request for taxpayer relief from arrears interest under section 220(3.1) of the Income Tax Act.

The arrears stemmed from a 1998 charitable donation deduction involving a hedge fund that was subsequently reassessed.

The applicant argued the denial was unreasonable given a previous settlement to reconsider the matter.

The Federal Court found the decision maker's reasoning justified and intelligible, concluding that the CRA's decision to deny relief, based on the applicant's failure to address the balance and lack of CRA delay, was reasonable.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The applicant sought a stay of his deportation to Colombia pending his application for leave and judicial review of a decision rejecting his pre-removal risk assessment (PRRA).

The Federal Court found that the applicant did not come to the Court with "clean hands" because his affidavit in support of the motion was misleading.

Specifically, he failed to disclose his history of entering Canada with a fraudulent passport and the details of his criminal history, and gave an incredible explanation for his guilty plea to a robbery charge.

The Court concluded that the serious omissions in his affidavit undermined the integrity of the proceeding, disentitling him to the equitable relief of a stay.

The motion for a stay was dismissed.

The Crown brought a motion for summary judgment to recover an advance payment made to the defendant under the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Advance Payments Program.

After the defendant defaulted, the Minister honoured the guarantee and became subrogated to the debt.

The defendant argued the administrator organization breached its duties by misapplying sale proceeds to other debts.

The Federal Court granted the motion, finding that the administrator's actions could not bind the Crown and there was no genuine issue for trial.

The Crown moved for summary judgment to recover a debt owed by the defendants under the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Advance Payments Program.

The motion was considered in writing and granted based on the reasons set out in a related matter.

The self-represented applicant appealed an order of a Prothonotary dismissing his motion for her recusal on the basis of bias.

The applicant argued that the Prothonotary erred in a previous direction regarding the filing of a Notice of Appearance.

The Federal Court found that disagreement with a prior decision does not establish bias, and dismissed the appeal, noting that the motion and appeal were wholly without merit.