Craig Brown

This decision concerns the approval of a pro-rata apportionment of insurance proceeds, legal fees, and disbursements among multiple plaintiffs in six related actions arising from a 2018 motor coach collision in Ontario involving Chinese tourists.

The court reviews the collaborative process among counsel, the narrowing of liability to two defendants, and the reasonableness of the proposed settlement distribution.

The court also addresses its jurisdiction to grant the requested relief, the sufficiency of evidence supporting the motion, and the process for future motions involving parties under disability.

The moving parties, including Chartwell Retirement Residences, Sienna Senior Living Inc., Extendicare Inc., and Schlegel Villages Inc., brought four motions for leave to appeal the decision of Morgan J. dated March 7, 2024.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motions for leave to appeal without costs.

This endorsement addresses two motions for leave to appeal before the Divisional Court.

The Plaintiffs' motion for leave to appeal a "set aside" order was dismissed with costs awarded to the Defendants.

Concurrently, the Defendants' motion for leave to appeal earlier certification decisions was dismissed without costs, having become moot.

The applicant, a minor, sought court approval for a settlement of her Statutory Accident Benefits claim and leave to amend her notice of application.

The court granted leave to amend, approved the $100,000 settlement, and approved a solicitor-client account for fees and disbursements, with the settlement funds to be paid directly to the applicant upon her 18th birthday.

The court declined to approve the contingency fee agreement due to deficiencies.

The Grand River Conservation Authority (GRCA) sought a permanent injunction against the respondent, Vidhya Ramdas, for contravening O. Reg. 150/06 by undertaking development, including site grading and fill placement, within regulated wetland areas on her property without a permit.

Despite multiple warnings, a stop-work order, and charges, the respondent continued the unauthorized activities.

The court granted the injunction, finding a flagrant breach of the regulation, and awarded costs to the GRCA.

This ruling addresses costs arising from two motions brought by the applicant father: one to vary a temporary access order and another to strike the respondent mother's pleadings.

The motions resulted in divided success, with the father obtaining increased supervised access but not unsupervised access, and the mother's pleadings not being struck.

The court found that both parties had not acted with the requisite maturity and incurred unnecessary legal costs.

Consequently, the court declined to award costs to either party, citing Rule 24 of the Family Law Rules, to encourage future cooperation and discourage an inflexible approach to parenting.

During a continued pretrial in a civil action involving multiple defendants in an equipment-related dispute, the parties were unable to reach resolution.

The court addressed scheduling concerns for an anticipated lengthy jury trial estimated to take six to eight weeks.

The matter was removed from the May 2016 blitz sittings, and the case management judge indicated that a trial date would be fixed, potentially in another judicial region to accommodate the extended duration.

Directions were also provided regarding pretrial motions, preparation of joint document books, and submission of proposed jury questions in advance of the pretrial motions.

The Court of Appeal issued a costs endorsement following the dismissal of two appeals by the appellant, African Lion Safari & Game Farm Ltd. The appellant was ordered to pay costs of $100,000 inclusive of GST and disbursements to the Cowles and Balac respondents, to be allocated between them.

An additional $20,000 inclusive of GST and disbursements was awarded to Jennifer Anne Cowles for her separate representation.

In this personal injury appeal arising from a tiger attack at a drive-through safari zoo, the appellant challenged liability findings, the striking of its jury notice, the exclusion of surveillance evidence, and the treatment of contributory negligence in strict liability.

The majority held that the trial judge applied the correct jury-discharge test and was entitled to conclude that the legal, medical, actuarial, and evidentiary complexities made a judge-alone trial preferable.

Although the majority agreed that the investigator's evidence was wrongly excluded because any breach of professional conduct rules was a matter for the Law Society and not admissibility, the error was harmless because the appellant failed to show any possible effect on the result.

The majority also held it was unnecessary to decide the contributory negligence issue because the trial judge found the plaintiffs had not deliberately lowered the windows, and found no palpable and overriding error in the factual findings.

The appeal was dismissed, with a partial dissent that would have ordered a new trial on liability.