Jamie Spotswood

The plaintiffs brought a motion seeking a declaration that certain communications with their lawyers, which were inadvertently left on the defendants' email servers after a share purchase transaction, were subject to solicitor-client privilege.

The plaintiffs also sought leave to file a supplementary affidavit after cross-examinations.

The court granted leave to file the new affidavit.

On the privilege motion, the court found that the plaintiffs' law firm did not represent the target companies during the transaction, meaning no joint privilege passed to the purchaser.

The court also held that the plaintiffs did not waive privilege by using the company email servers, as the disclosure was inadvertent and they maintained a reasonable expectation of privacy.

The court reviewed the documents and declared which ones were privileged.

The plaintiff hospital brought an action against the defendant contractor for damages resulting from an over-humidification event that damaged operating room equipment.

The plaintiff alleged the defendant failed to properly install an air handling unit by omitting a required interlock between the supply fan and humidifier.

The defendant argued the damage was caused by hospital staff manually overriding the system.

The court found the defendant liable for breach of contract due to the installation deficiency and failure to train hospital staff, awarding the plaintiff full damages of $908,345.13.

The plaintiffs, having succeeded in the action, sought costs.

They argued that their February offer to settle entitled them to elevated costs under Rule 49.

The court found that the offer contained no real compromise on the principal amount and that the fixed costs offer could not be evaluated as a compromise.

Consequently, the court awarded the plaintiffs their costs on a partial indemnity scale, fixed at $54,000 all-inclusive.

The plaintiffs, real estate brokers, sued the defendant for unpaid commission on a $17 million property purchase.

The parties disagreed on whether the defendant had orally accepted the plaintiffs' offer to reduce their commission from 1.5% to 0.75%.

On cross-motions for summary judgment, the court utilized its enhanced fact-finding powers, including hearing oral evidence, to assess credibility.

The court found the plaintiffs' evidence more reliable and consistent with the documentary record, concluding that the defendant had not accepted the reduced commission offer.

The plaintiffs were awarded judgment for the full commission amount of $288,150.

Following successful applications for declarations that the respondent insurers had a duty to defend, the applicants sought costs on a full indemnity basis.

The insurers did not dispute the scale but argued the amounts claimed were disproportionate and unreasonable.

The court found the insurers' criticisms unhelpful as they did not disclose their own dockets.

The court awarded $50,000 all inclusive to each applicant.

The plaintiff's insurer brought a motion to enforce a settlement agreement regarding its subrogated claim for property damage caused by the defendant's excavation.

The defendant had agreed to pay $400,000 to the insurer, but payment was deferred until a settlement with the named plaintiffs or the outcome of a liability trial.

The defendant subsequently settled with the named plaintiffs and obtained a release, effectively eliminating the liability trial.

The court held that the insurer had standing to enforce the agreement by motion in the main action and ordered the defendant to pay the $400,000 immediately, as the condition for payment had been met by the settlement with the named plaintiffs.

The defendants brought a motion for an order requiring the plaintiffs to serve a further and better affidavit of documents, specifically seeking financial documents relevant to the plaintiffs' damages claims.

The plaintiffs argued that the defendants were precluded from seeking these documents because they had agreed to a Discovery Plan that excluded them.

The court found that the defendants had explicitly reserved their right to pursue the financial information when agreeing to the Discovery Plan.

The court ordered the plaintiffs to produce their financial statements and tax returns, as they were relevant to the claims for business losses, but declined to order production of other speculative documents at this stage.

The plaintiff brought a motion for summary judgment on a contractual refund claim after the CRA disallowed SR&ED tax credits prepared by the defendant tax consultants.

The defendants brought a cross-motion for summary judgment dismissing the claim based on the limitation period, and the personal defendant sought to dismiss the claim against him.

The court dismissed all motions, finding that the refund claim was inextricably linked with the defendants' counterclaim for breach of contract, making partial summary judgment inappropriate.

The court also found sufficient evidence to require a trial on the personal claim against the individual defendant.

The applicant and respondent, corporate entities controlled by a son and father respectively, jointly owned a commercial property.

The applicant sought an order for the sale of the property under the Partition Act, which the respondent opposed, citing malicious conduct and a contractual right of first refusal.

The respondent also claimed unpaid rental income.

The court held that the applicant had a prima facie right to sell the property and had not acted maliciously, but was bound by the right of first refusal.

The court ordered that the applicant's prior offer to sell its interest to the respondent remain open for an additional 60 days, after which the property could be sold on the open market if no agreement was reached.

The court also ordered the applicant to pay the respondent its share of outstanding rental payments.

The applicants, engineering consultants, sought a declaration that they were entitled to a defence and indemnity from the respondent insurer under a construction insurance policy for underlying actions alleging negligence and nuisance arising from a shoring system design.

The insurer denied coverage based on a professional services exclusion.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the nuisance claims were based on acts arising out of the rendering of professional services, and therefore the exclusion clause clearly and unambiguously applied to preclude the duty to defend.

The self-represented appellant commenced a dental malpractice action against the respondent dentists.

The respondents moved for summary judgment on the basis that the appellant had not delivered an expert report supporting her claim, but the respondents themselves did not file any expert evidence regarding the standard of care.

The motion judge granted summary judgment and dismissed the action.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that the moving party defendants failed to discharge their evidentiary burden under Rule 20 to put their best foot forward by adducing evidence on the merits of their defence.

The appellants appealed the dismissal of their claims against the respondent in his personal capacity and as estate trustee for their parents' estates.

The appellants argued the trial judge erred in finding no secret trust existed, in concluding the respondent did not hold a property in trust, and by intervening during testimony in a way that created a reasonable apprehension of bias.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the trial judge's assessment of the evidence and credibility, and concluding the single intervention did not meet the threshold for bias.

Livent Inc., through its special receiver, sued its former auditor, Deloitte & Touche, for negligence and breach of contract in failing to detect a massive fraud perpetrated by Livent's senior management.

The trial judge found Deloitte negligent in its conduct of the 1997 audit and awarded Livent $118 million in damages.

Deloitte appealed, arguing that the ex turpi causa and corporate identification doctrines barred the claim, and that its negligence did not cause the losses.

Livent cross-appealed the trial judge's refusal to award damages for the 1996 audit and the 25% reduction for contingencies.

The Court of Appeal dismissed both the appeal and cross-appeal, holding that the ex turpi causa doctrine could not shield an auditor from liability for failing to detect the very fraud it was engaged to uncover, and that Deloitte's negligence was the proximate cause of Livent's increased liabilities.

The appellant sub-tenant appealed a trial judgment ordering him to pay $18,060.42 in realty tax arrears to the respondent Township.

The appellant argued that the sublease did not permit retroactive tax collection, that the Township lacked authority to sue for the arrears, and that the claim was barred by the doctrine of laches.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the sublease clearly made the appellant responsible for all applicable realty taxes, the Township sued properly under the contract, and the delay in assessment was caused by the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation rather than the Township.

In a receivership-related motion arising from alleged fraudulent investment activities, the receiver sought authorization to utilize frozen funds held by entities subject to prior court orders to pay ongoing investigation costs.

The court held that the circumstances differed from typical insolvency proceedings because many affected entities were not parties and no specific allegations had been pleaded against them.

Exercising discretion under the prior freezing order, the court declined to allow prepayment of the receiver’s investigative expenses from the frozen funds.

The court also rejected a request for a sealing order due to the strong presumption of open courts but granted a confidentiality order restricting the receiver from voluntarily providing information to tax or criminal authorities.

Costs were not awarded due to divided success.