Fraud allegations

This decision addresses the costs following a successful motion by the Defendant, Hantover Canada Inc., for a permanent stay of proceedings.

The court had previously ordered a permanent stay, finding the Plaintiff's action duplicative, an abuse of process, and disclosing no reasonable cause of action.

The Defendant sought substantial indemnity costs of $86,843, citing the Plaintiff's unreasonable conduct, non-compliance with court directions (e.g., page limits for submissions), and the serious, unfounded allegations of fraud, conspiracy, and breach of fiduciary duty.

The Plaintiff, who is self-represented, opposed the costs award, primarily attempting to relitigate the original motion and claiming impecuniosity.

The court found the Plaintiff's conduct unreasonable and sanctioned it with an elevated cost award, noting his history of multiple actions and unpaid cost awards.

While acknowledging impecuniosity can be a factor, the court determined it would not shield the Plaintiff from accountability for his reprehensible conduct.

The court awarded the Defendant $82,000 in substantial indemnity costs.

This endorsement addresses the costs of an eight-day trial where the plaintiffs were entirely successful in their claims and in dismissing the defendants' counterclaim.

The plaintiffs sought substantial indemnity costs, arguing the defendants' conduct, including unsubstantiated fraud allegations and disclosure failures, warranted an elevated scale.

The defendants opposed the quantum and scale, and the plaintiffs also sought costs against the defendants' principal, Mr. Tajbakhsh, and an unidentified third-party funder.

The court awarded the plaintiffs $1 million in substantial indemnity costs, finding the defendants' conduct, while not amounting to fraud on the court, justified the elevated scale.

However, the court declined to award costs against Mr. Tajbakhsh personally or the third-party funder, as the high threshold for non-party costs (abuse of process or fraud) was not met.

The court also explicitly prohibited the defendants from using Limited Partnership funds to satisfy the costs award.

The case involved three interrelated motions within the receivership of ProjectCo, the entity responsible for the St. Michael’s Hospital redevelopment.

Unity Health Toronto sought to lift a stay of proceedings to terminate the Project Agreement due to ProjectCo's defaults.

The Bank of Montreal, as Administrative Agent for the Lenders, sought an order to assign ProjectCo's rights to enforce a Tower Interim Completion (TIC) payment and to dismiss Unity's motion.

Unity also sought to dismiss the Lenders' TIC application for lack of standing.

The court granted Unity's motion to lift the stay and to dismiss the Lenders' TIC application, and dismissed the Lenders' assignment motion.

The court found Unity would be materially prejudiced by the stay's continuation, while the Lenders' prejudice was contractually prescribed.

The Lenders lacked standing for the TIC application, and no legal or equitable assignment of ProjectCo's rights to enforce the TIC payment existed.

The appellant, as litigation administrator of her father's estate, appealed the dismissal of an action concerning an alleged unauthorized property transfer and a personal costs award.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, upholding the trial judge's findings that the property transfer was authorized, for valuable consideration, and that the action was statute-barred.

The court also dismissed the costs appeal, affirming the personal costs award against the appellant due to her unreasonable conduct and pursuit of litigation primarily for personal benefit based on unsubstantiated fraud allegations.

The Mortgagee Plaintiffs sought summary judgment to enforce a syndicated loan and mortgage against the Joseph-Walker Parties, who defaulted.

The Joseph-Walker Parties alleged fraud by other defendants and, later, by the Mortgagee Plaintiffs themselves, and sought to adjourn the motion.

The court denied the adjournment, finding no genuine issue for trial regarding the Mortgagee Plaintiffs' claims or the fraud allegations against them.

Summary judgment was provisionally granted for the Mortgagee Plaintiffs, including payment of the outstanding loan amount, possession, and writs of possession, conditional on adding seven non-party mortgagees to the action to ensure they are bound by the order.

The court also addressed the consolidation of related proceedings and the principles of partial summary judgment.

This motion concerned an application by 2441799 Ontario Inc. to amend its Notice of Application to add Gil Shcolyar as a respondent and to make related amendments.

The applicant sought to add claims against Mr. Shcolyar, the sole director and officer of the respondent 2474187 Ontario Inc., alleging improper conduct related to a lease renewal, a proposed property purchase, and the termination of the lease.

The court granted leave to add Mr. Shcolyar as a respondent and allowed most of the proposed amendments, finding sufficient factual underpinning.

However, allegations of fraud against Mr. Shcolyar were dismissed without prejudice, with leave granted to the applicant to re-plead them with sufficient particulars.

This endorsement addresses costs arising from the Plaintiff's motion for particulars and the Defendants' motion to compel cross-examination.

The motion for particulars was resolved on consent, with the Plaintiff ultimately obtaining clarity on the scope of serious allegations made against him in the Statement of Defence and Counterclaim.

The court found the Defendants' conduct necessitated the motion for particulars and awarded the Plaintiff $7,500 in costs.

Regarding the cross-examination motion, the court found divided success, noting that while cross-examination occurred, its scope exceeded the court's order and provided limited assistance to the particulars motion.

Consequently, no costs were awarded for the cross-examination motion.

The Applicant sought substantial indemnity costs against the self-represented Respondent in complex estate litigation that had been case-managed for years.

The estate was simple, but the Respondent's conduct, including unsubstantiated allegations of fraud, repeated attempts to relitigate resolved issues, and delaying tactics, unnecessarily prolonged the proceedings.

The court found the Applicant almost entirely successful on substantive issues and determined that the Respondent's conduct was reprehensible, warranting an award of substantial indemnity costs.

The court rejected the Respondent's arguments that costs should be paid from the estate or that her self-represented status or disability should mitigate the award, finding her conduct abusive and meritless.

The defendants Tarun Channa and Ashok Dhillon brought a motion to compel the plaintiffs (trustees of the Estate of William Buik) to provide particulars for their Statement of Claim.

The plaintiffs' claim alleged violations of the Fraudulent Conveyances Act and Assignments and Preferences Act, breach of constructive trust, and unjust enrichment, based on documents provided by the moving defendants during examinations in aid of execution.

The court, applying Rule 25.06(8) regarding fraud allegations, found that while the plaintiffs were not required to provide particulars for damages, they must provide particulars for the "impugned transactions" (dates, amounts, parties) to identify the specific fraudulent or improper transfers, even though the source documents were largely within the defendants' knowledge.

The motion was partially granted, and a timetable for further litigation steps was set.

The plaintiffs sought a Mareva injunction against multiple defendants in a dispute involving cryptocurrency investments.

The motion was dismissed for the third time, as the plaintiffs failed to provide sufficient evidence of a strong prima facie case or a real risk of asset dissipation by the defendants.

The court found the dispute to be primarily contractual, not indicative of fraudulent asset flight.

Costs were awarded to the defendants on a substantive indemnity scale.

The Applicant sought to amend its Fresh As Amended Statement of Claim in a trial of an issue concerning fraud allegations related to a prior summary judgment.

The court granted leave to amend for clerical errors and some factual expansions, but denied the bulk of the proposed amendments, including new causes of action and irrelevant/evidentiary allegations, finding them beyond the scope of the directed trial of an issue and that the delay caused presumptive prejudice.

The appellant, Joan Holmes, appealed a summary judgment granted in favour of the respondents, Aurelio and Maria Acquaviva, in a mortgage enforcement action.

Holmes had defaulted on a mortgage payment and subsequently alleged an elaborate mortgage fraud against the respondents and others in a separate action.

The motion judge found no genuine issue requiring a trial, concluding that Holmes had not provided evidence to support her fraud claims and that the mortgage claims were severable from her fraud allegations.

The Court of Appeal upheld the motion judge's decision, finding no error in his analysis or conclusion that there was no genuine issue requiring a trial.

The appeal was dismissed, and costs were awarded to the respondents on a full indemnity scale.

The appellant, Narine Loojune, appealed an order that substituted the Public Guardian and Trustee (PGT) as guardian of property for his catastrophically injured nephew, Dataram Loojune.

The substitution was ordered due to the appellant's repeated failure to comply with court-ordered obligations to account for his nephew's property.

The appellant sought to adjourn the appeal to submit fresh evidence alleging fraud by a PGT employee and argued the motion judge applied the wrong legal test and was biased.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the adjournment application, finding no credible evidence to support the claims or impact the appeal.

The court affirmed the motion judge's application of the "best interests" test and found no evidence of fraud, harassment, or judicial bias.

The appeal was dismissed, and the appellant was ordered to pay costs to the PGT.

The plaintiff, Mennie Manangan, brought an action for damages related to the purchase of a restaurant business and sought disbursal of sale proceeds from her home.

The defendants, including 2166729 Ontario Inc., brought a counterclaim for summary judgment to enforce three vendor-takeback mortgages granted by Manangan, on which she had defaulted.

The court dismissed Manangan's motion for disbursal of sale proceeds and granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment, dismissing Manangan's claim and granting judgment on the counterclaim for $184,679.54 plus interest.

The court found Manangan's claims to be without merit, that she lacked standing for contract claims, and that she failed to provide evidence to establish a genuine issue for trial.

Full indemnity costs were awarded to the defendants due to the plaintiff's unmeritorious claim, delay, and unsubstantiated fraud allegations.

The applicant, A.B., brought a motion seeking orders for substitute service of her application materials on the respondent, C.D., by email, and for the anonymization of the names of the parties and their children in the court file.

A.B. alleged C.D. was involved in a multi-million-dollar fraud, leading to threats against her and the children, and C.D.'s whereabouts were unknown.

The court granted both requests, finding substitute service appropriate given C.D.'s evasion and anonymization necessary to protect the family from physical and psychological harm, balancing it against the open court principle.

Costs were awarded to the applicant for the substitute service portion of the motion.

The Plaintiffs (Bondfield Construction Company Limited and Zurich Insurance Company Ltd.) brought a motion to stay summary judgment motions initiated by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC) in complex professional negligence actions against auditors, which also involved significant fraud allegations and discoverability issues.

The court, acting as case management judge, granted the stay, determining that full documentary and oral discoveries were essential to ensure a fair and efficient process.

The decision highlighted the complexity of the case, the substantial damages sought, the allegations of long-standing fraudulent activities, and the potential for inconsistent findings if the summary judgment motions proceeded on a limited record.

The court emphasized the flexibility of judges in case-managed matters and the necessity of a comprehensive record for a just adjudication of limitation period issues.

The appellant, Anita Csizmazia, appealed an order refusing to set aside a final order made after an uncontested trial.

She alleged misrepresentation and concealment of facts by the respondent, Zoltan Csizmazia, and a significant miscarriage of justice.

The review judge had dismissed her motion, noting that her financial issues were moot due to her bankruptcy and rejecting her claim of lack of notice.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the review judge's reasons sufficient and affirming that the appellant's bankruptcy rendered her equalization claims moot, thus making it unnecessary to address the fraud allegations.

The McKillips, successful defendants in a motion to strike, sought substantial indemnity costs against the plaintiff Trustee in Bankruptcy.

The court awarded costs on a substantial indemnity basis for the period when fraud allegations were pleaded and partial indemnity thereafter, totaling $42,836.

The court found the fraud allegations, even if later clarified, warranted enhanced costs due to their serious nature and the Trustee's recklessness in pleading them without sufficient particulars.

The court also ruled that the costs should be paid by the Estate, or personally by the Trustee if the Estate lacked funds, rejecting the Trustee's argument for set-off against amounts owed by Susan McKillip in a separate unjust enrichment action.

The respondent brought a motion seeking payment into court by the applicant for accrued and future interest under the Mortgages Act and for security for costs under Rule 56.01(1)(d).

The applicant opposed, arguing the initial consent order for payment into court was sufficient and that security for costs was unwarranted.

The court found the applicant's financial disclosure insufficient to rebut the presumption for security for costs and ordered the applicant to pay an additional sum for interest shortfall and a sum for security for costs into court.

This endorsement addresses the quantum of costs following the dismissal of the Applicant Wife's motion for partition and sale of the matrimonial home.

The motion was dismissed because a prior consent order permitted the Respondent Husband to purchase the Applicant's interest.

The Respondent sought full recovery costs, citing the Applicant's unreasonable litigation conduct and an offer to settle.

The court found the Applicant's conduct unreasonable, including ignoring page limits, attempting to argue issues beyond time limits, misrepresenting hardship, and making unfounded allegations of fraud.

However, full recovery costs were denied because the Respondent's offer to settle was a final offer on equalization and not specific to the motion in question.

The Respondent was awarded partial indemnity costs of $5,500, inclusive of HST and disbursements, to be deducted from the Applicant's share of the matrimonial home.