Lawrence Brian Geffen

The Applicant sought various orders including vesting of the matrimonial home, child support, spousal support, section 7 expenses, life insurance, and a divorce.

The Respondent's pleadings were struck due to non-compliance with financial disclosure orders, and the matter proceeded as an uncontested trial.

The court imputed income to the Respondent and granted most of the Applicant's requests for support, equalization, and property transfer, but declined to compel the Respondent to facilitate the children's Romanian passports.

Costs were awarded to the Applicant on a full indemnity basis due to the Respondent's unreasonable conduct.

The maternal grandmother brought a motion for access to her two grandchildren pending her appeal of a trial decision granting Crown wardship without access.

Due to systemic delays, the motion was heard two months after access had been terminated and a good-bye visit had occurred.

The court found that while access with one child had been meaningful, restoring access now would expose the child to the risk of a second final separation if the appeal failed.

Assessing the appeal as unlikely to succeed, the court concluded that restoring access was not in the child's best interests and dismissed the motion.

The appellant father appealed a trial judgment ordering that his child be made a Crown ward with no access for the purpose of adoption.

The father raised numerous grounds of appeal, primarily challenging the trial judge's findings of fact regarding his parenting capacity, criminal history, and mental health, as well as the refusal to extend Society wardship or grant access.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge made no palpable and overriding errors in her factual findings or application of the law, and ordered the child to be placed in an adoptive home without further delay.

A child protection trial concerning two young children (ages 5 and 4) where the Children's Aid Society of Toronto sought crown wardship without access for purposes of adoption.

The mother opposed the application and sought return of the children to her care subject to a supervision order.

The court found the children in need of protection due to the mother's serious mental illness (schizophrenia), which resulted in multiple involuntary hospitalizations and periods of inability to care for the children.

Although the mother demonstrated some mental health stabilization and was cooperative with services, the court found she lacked insight into her condition, had no adequate safety plan for potential relapses, and demonstrated inadequate parenting skills despite therapeutic intervention.

The court ordered the children to be made crown wards without access, finding this was in the children's best interests given their need for certainty, stability, and permanence.

A summary judgment motion brought by the Children's Aid Society of Toronto seeking a finding that two children were in need of protection and should be made crown wards without access for adoption purposes.

The mother had experienced multiple severe mental health breakdowns requiring psychiatric hospitalization.

The court found no triable issue regarding the finding of need for protection but dismissed the society's summary judgment motion on disposition and access issues, finding genuine issues for trial regarding whether the mother had made sufficient mental health gains and whether the children's best interests would be served by return to her care under a supervision order.

The applicants brought a motion for security for costs of an appeal initiated by the respondent mother regarding a custody and access judgment.

The respondent argued she was impecunious and could not afford to pay costs.

The court found that while the appeal had a low prospect of success, it did not meet the strict threshold of being frivolous and vexatious under Rule 61.06(1)(a).

However, because the respondent's father was funding her litigation, the court found 'other good reason' to order security for costs under Rule 61.06(1)(c).

The respondent was ordered to pay $10,000 into court.

The appellants, parents of a four-year-old child, appealed a decision making the child a Crown ward without access for the purpose of adoption.

The child had been apprehended at birth and previously found to be in need of protection.

The appellants argued the trial judge erred in finding a lack of cooperation and failed to give sufficient weight to their positive visits.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge's key factual findings were supported by the evidence and the disposition was in the child's best interests.