Julia Lauren Lefebvre

The moving parties sought an order restraining a private investigator from disclosing or assisting others in disclosing documents and information obtained through the discovery process in related civil litigation.

The investigator, who was not a party to the action, had obtained thousands of documents produced on discovery and had disseminated some of them to third parties, including media outlets, and moved the documents outside the jurisdiction.

The court considered the scope and purpose of the deemed undertaking rule under Rule 30.1.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure and authorities recognizing that the rule protects discovery material from collateral use.

It held that the court has jurisdiction to restrain third parties who knowingly obtain and use discovery documents contrary to the rule.

Given the investigator’s deliberate conduct in soliciting and disseminating the documents and attempting to evade court authority, a restraining order was warranted.

A physician plaintiff sued another physician and related institutions for negligence and false imprisonment after being involuntarily detained for psychiatric assessment under a Form 1 pursuant to the Mental Health Act.

The court held that the defendant physician breached the standard of care by failing to conduct a proper personal examination and by relying on unreliable third‑party information before completing the Form 1.

The improper completion of the Form 1 meant the resulting detention was unauthorized and constituted false imprisonment.

The plaintiff established compensable psychiatric injury and economic loss caused by the negligent and unlawful detention.

The court awarded general damages and reduced income loss but denied punitive damages and prevented double recovery between the negligence and false imprisonment claims.

Following the granting of a summary judgment motion in favour of the defendants in a medical negligence action, the court considered the defendants’ request for costs against the remaining plaintiffs.

The defendants sought modest costs despite incurring substantially higher legal fees and disbursements, largely related to expert reports.

The plaintiffs made no submissions on the costs issue despite having the opportunity to do so.

The court found the defendants’ request reasonable, particularly given conduct by the responding party that had unnecessarily prolonged the proceedings.

Costs of $5,000 were awarded to each of the two defendants seeking costs.