Ken H. Nathens

The parties, parents to an eight-year-old boy, separated in 2022 following an incident of family violence.

The father sought increased parenting time and a corresponding reduction in child support, while the mother sought retroactive child support and proportionate sharing of various extracurricular activities as section 7 expenses.

The court found that increasing the father's parenting time was not in the child's best interests given the child's distress from the parents' conflict and need for stability.

The court ordered the father to pay child support arrears and determined which extracurricular activities qualified as extraordinary expenses to be shared proportionately.

The applicant father sought full indemnity costs from the respondent mother following a successful motion where the mother was found to have acted in bad faith by unilaterally changing the children's school and residence in breach of a separation agreement.

The court reviewed the legal framework for costs, particularly Rule 24(8) of the Family Law Rules regarding bad faith.

The court found the mother's actions, including concealing information, deceiving the father and the school principal, and breaching the agreement, constituted bad faith.

The court awarded the father full recovery costs of $21,319.45, emphasizing that such an order was necessary to condemn and discourage the mother's self-help behaviour.

The applicant father sought orders to prevent the respondent mother from unilaterally changing the children's school and residence, contrary to a separation agreement providing for joint decision-making.

The mother had sold her home, purchased a new one further away, and enrolled the children in a new Christian school without the father's consent or prior discussion, despite the children previously attending a Catholic school and the agreement stipulating joint educational decisions.

The court emphasized strong disapproval of self-help remedies in family law, finding the mother's actions detrimental to the children's best interests and a breach of the separation agreement.

The court ordered the children to remain in their current Catholic school and for their school-week residence to be no further than 55 km from the school, maintaining the status quo pending trial.

The parties, an unmarried couple, each brought a motion to change parenting time for their two children.

The applicant father sought to expand his parenting time to an equal regime, while the respondent mother sought to reduce the father's parenting time and requested Office of the Children's Lawyer (OCL) involvement.

The court granted the father's request for equal temporary parenting time, finding his proposal to be in the children's best interests, and dismissed the mother's request to reduce time.

The court also requested OCL involvement and made orders regarding pick-up/drop-off locations and telephone access.

Costs were awarded to the father.

The parties entered into Minutes of Settlement to resolve multi-jurisdictional family litigation by consolidating their dispute into an alternative dispute resolution process in Ontario.

The day after signing, the moving party was served with a new defamation proceeding commenced by the responding party in Iran.

The moving party sought to set aside the Minutes of Settlement, arguing the new proceeding was a fundamental breach.

The court found that the responding party's failure to disclose and withdraw the defamation claim constituted a fundamental breach of an implied term to end all related litigation.

The court allowed the motion, set aside the Minutes of Settlement, but declined to award damages or address jurisdiction.

The Respondent father moved to set aside Minutes of Settlement (MOS), arguing the Applicant mother fundamentally breached them by commencing a new defamation proceeding in Iran the day after signing the MOS, which was intended to consolidate all litigation.

The Applicant mother cross-moved to enforce the MOS and for the Ontario court to assume jurisdiction over parenting issues.

The court found that the Applicant's failure to disclose and refusal to withdraw the Iranian defamation claim constituted a fundamental breach of the MOS, as the agreement's core purpose was to terminate all multi-jurisdictional litigation arising from the marriage breakdown in favour of an alternative dispute resolution process in Ontario.

The court set aside the MOS, dismissed the Applicant's cross-motion, and declined to address the question of jurisdiction at that stage.

This is a costs endorsement from the Court of Appeal for Ontario following the dismissal of an appeal.

The respondent sought substantial indemnity costs.

The court reviewed the submissions and fixed costs in favour of the respondent at $22,500, inclusive of disbursements and HST, rejecting the claim for substantial indemnity costs.

The appellant mother appealed a trial judgment concerning parenting time, decision-making responsibility, and child support.

The Court of Appeal dismissed her motion to introduce fresh evidence, upholding the trial judge's parenting order which included shared parenting time and the father having final decision-making responsibility.

The court also affirmed the trial judge's calculation of the father's income for child support purposes.

However, the Court of Appeal remitted the issue of child support arrears for a six-month period (September 2019 to February 2020) to the trial judge for further consideration, as it was not addressed in the original reasons.

This is a costs endorsement from the Court of Appeal for Ontario.

Following an appeal, the court ordered the appellant to pay $17,500 in costs to the respondent.

The court also provided a general observation, encouraging counsel to attempt to agree on costs before the hearing to avoid unnecessary delay and additional expenses.

This is an appeal from a final order in matrimonial proceedings concerning equalization of net family property, child support, and other financial matters.

The appellant challenged the trial judge's findings on the date of separation, pre-marital assets, imputed income for child support, and post-separation expenses.

The respondent cross-appealed on s. 7 expenses.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding errors in the trial judge's factual findings, which were largely based on credibility assessments.

The cross-appeal was also dismissed, with the issue of s. 7 expenses referred back to the trial judge for resolution via a 14B motion.

The applicant father brought an urgent, ex parte motion for sole custody and exclusive possession of the matrimonial home, which was initially granted but later reversed when the respondent mother provided her materials.

The respondent sought costs on a full recovery basis.

The court found that the applicant acted in bad faith by failing to provide full and frank disclosure on the ex parte motion, deliberately misleading the court regarding the mother's drug use and mental health.

The court awarded the respondent costs on a full recovery basis in the amount of $17,764.80.

A proposed intervener brought a motion for leave to intervene as a friend of the court in a family law appeal concerning child custody and the best interests of the children.

The appellant consented, but the respondent opposed the motion.

The court acknowledged the proposed intervener's expertise but dismissed the motion, finding that the late timing of the application would cause significant prejudice to the respondent, who would not have adequate time to respond to the intervener's factum before the scheduled appeal hearing.

The applicant and respondent disputed the date of separation, the respondent's date of marriage assets, and the respondent's income for child support purposes.

The court determined the date of separation to be July 3, 2014, when joint marriage counselling ended and there was no reasonable prospect of resuming cohabitation.

The court rejected the respondent's claim of a $200,000 date of marriage asset due to lack of evidence.

Finally, the court imputed an annual income of $75,000 to the respondent for child support, finding him intentionally under-employed.

The respondent was ordered to pay equalization and post-separation adjustments.

Following a five-day family law trial primarily concerning spousal support, both parties sought costs.

The applicant sought partial indemnity costs of $113,000, while the respondent sought $17,000.

The court found that both parties took unreasonable positions that prolonged the trial, resulting in divided success.

The respondent was awarded a lump sum of $46,000 for spousal support, far less than the $500,000 claimed, while the applicant was successful in arguing that support should be based on income rather than assets.

Given the divided success, the court ordered each party to bear their own costs.

The parties separated after a 25-year marriage.

The respondent husband, who was disabled and unable to work, sought $500,000 in lump sum spousal support out of the applicant wife's assets, while the applicant sought child support for their adult son and dismissal of the spousal support claim.

The court found the respondent was entitled to non-compensatory spousal support due to his medical condition and financial need.

Applying the Spousal Support Advisory Guidelines and considering the applicant's income-producing assets, the court ordered the applicant to pay a lump sum of $46,000 to achieve a clean break.

The claims for child support and repayment of joint funds were dismissed.

The applicant wife sought interim spousal support and a non-dissipation order.

The parties consented to the non-dissipation order.

The court addressed interim spousal support, considering the husband's high income ($2.09 million/year) and the wife's imputed income ($30,000/year) after a 15.5-year relationship.

The court applied the Spousal Support Advisory Guidelines (SSAG) principles for high-income earners, noting the SSAG ceiling is not a hard cap.

Considering the non-compensatory nature of the support, the substantial equalization payments already made and anticipated, and the parties' relative budgets, the court ordered the husband to pay $30,000 per month in temporary spousal support, a 50% increase from previous consensual payments.

The issue of retroactive support was deferred to trial.

The appellant appealed a trial judgment dismissing her claim for support from the estate of her deceased spouse.

The appellant argued that a waiver of support clause in the marriage contract was contingent upon the matrimonial home being held in joint tenancy, and that when the home ceased to be so held, the waiver no longer applied.

The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial judge's decision, finding that two amendments to the marriage contract made clear that the home would be held in tenancy in common with certain rights to the appellant upon the respondent's death, and that neither amendment detracted from the waiver provision.

The court deferred to the trial judge's contractual interpretation and found no clearly identifiable error in law or palpable and overriding factual error.

The appellant appealed a summary judgment decision enforcing a Separation Agreement dated October 30, 2012, between the parties.

The appellant sought to set aside the agreement, alleging non-disclosure of assets by the respondent and arguing he did not understand the nature or consequences of the agreement.

The motion judge found no basis to set aside the agreement under section 56(4) of the Family Law Act.

The Court of Appeal upheld the decision, finding that the motion judge properly applied the legal test, made findings open to him, and that the parties were sophisticated individuals who had received independent legal advice.

The court noted that both parties had failed to fully disclose assets, making the appellant's claim disingenuous, and that the agreement itself contained acknowledgments of sufficient disclosure.

This decision addresses the costs of a six-day family law trial where the applicant, Michelle Grasso, was successful against the respondent, Rishi Bhatt, but unsuccessful against the Third Party Respondent, Dr. Gunvantrai Bhatt.

Dr. Bhatt was partially successful in his counter-claims against Ms. Grasso.

Dr. Bhatt sought costs against Ms. Grasso, arguing entitlement as the successful party and for full indemnity costs after a rejected settlement offer.

Ms. Grasso opposed, citing financial hardship and partial success against Rishi Bhatt.

The court, exercising judicial discretion, considered the parties' disparate financial positions, Ms. Grasso's unmeritorious claim against Dr. Bhatt, and Dr. Bhatt's unreasonable conduct during trial.

The court awarded Dr. Bhatt $41,716 in costs against Ms. Grasso, reducing the amount due to Dr. Bhatt's conduct and some unreasonable claims, and granted Ms. Grasso one year to make the full payment.

The applicant sought sole custody, child support, a restraining order, and a declaration of a beneficial interest in the family residence owned by her father-in-law (the third party respondent).

The respondent father did not participate in the trial.

The court granted the applicant sole custody, supervised access for the respondent, a restraining order, and retroactive and prospective child support based on an imputed income.

However, the court dismissed the applicant's trust and proprietary estoppel claims regarding the family residence, finding no credible evidence of financial contribution or a clear promise to transfer title.

The applicant was ordered to vacate the property and pay the third party respondent $13,640 in damages for trespass for unpaid utilities.