Lucas E. Lung

The parties, former spouses, owned an apartment building as joint tenants.

Their divorce agreement gave the appellant a right of first refusal to buy out the respondent's interest, contingent on securing financing and escrowing funds for tax liability.

The appellant failed to exercise this right within the 90-day deadline due to a disagreement over the tax calculation.

The respondent successfully applied for the sale of the property under the Partition Act.

The appellant appealed, arguing the judge misapprehended the dispute as a partition matter rather than a contract dispute.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding no extricable error of law and confirming the appellant's right of first refusal had lapsed.

This application concerned an oppression remedy under the Ontario Business Corporations Act, brought by a daughter (applicant) against her mother (respondent) and related corporations in a closely held family business.

The applicant alleged oppressive conduct by the respondent, specifically a debt conversion and share issue that diverted corporate revenues to the respondent and terminated the applicant's long-standing income stream.

The court applied the two-step test for oppression, finding that the applicant had a reasonable expectation of continued financial support and participation in the residual value of the corporation.

The court determined that the respondent's actions breached these reasonable expectations and constituted oppressive conduct.

Consequently, the debt conversion and share issue were set aside.

The court declined to remove the respondent as director but directed the parties to negotiate a fair resolution for ongoing payments based on their respective needs and available resources, with the option to return to court if an agreement could not be reached.

The defendant moved to set aside a default judgment and notice of garnishment obtained by the plaintiff.

The court granted the motion, finding that the defendant acted promptly upon learning of the judgment, provided a plausible explanation for the default due to improper service and lack of notification, and presented an arguable defence regarding defective products.

The court emphasized that the plaintiff's counsel failed to provide a courtesy copy of the claim or judgment to the defendant's retained counsel, and that the administration of justice favored a trial on the merits.

The moving party brought a motion under Rule 59.06 to vary an interlocutory injunction that prohibited him from competing with or soliciting customers of the responding party.

The court found that the responding party had failed to pursue their case with reasonable dispatch, as pleadings were not yet closed 15 months after the injunction was granted.

Furthermore, the contractual non-competition and non-solicitation periods in the Professional Services Agreement had already expired.

The court granted the motion in part, terminating the non-competition and non-solicitation obligations against the moving party personally.

This appeal concerned the application of well-established principles governing motions to set aside default judgment.

The Court of Appeal upheld the motion judge's decision not to set aside the default judgment, finding no error in the assessment that there was no air of reality to the proposed defences.

The appeal was dismissed, and costs were awarded to the respondent.

The Catalyst Parties brought actions for defamation, injurious falsehood, and conspiracy against various defendants, including media organizations, journalists, short sellers, and former borrowers, arising from the publication of a Wall Street Journal article and whistleblower complaints to the Ontario Securities Commission.

The defendants brought motions to dismiss the actions under the anti-SLAPP provisions of s. 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act.

The Catalyst Parties also brought a motion to dismiss four discrete defamation claims in a counterclaim brought by the West Face Parties.

The court granted the defendants' motions, dismissing the Defamation Action and the Wolfpack Action, finding that the expressions related to matters of public interest and that the public interest in protecting the expressions outweighed the public interest in allowing the actions to proceed, particularly given the Catalyst Parties' history of aggressive litigation and ethically dubious investigative tactics.

The court dismissed the Catalyst Parties' motion regarding the counterclaim, holding that partial anti-SLAPP motions are not permitted and that the counterclaim had substantial merit.

The applicants sought judicial review of the Toronto District School Board's decision to reduce the number of French immersion senior kindergarten classes at Palmerston Avenue Junior Public School from two to one.

The Divisional Court dismissed the application, finding that the decision to reallocate programs did not affect the rights, interests, or privileges of the applicants, and therefore did not attract a duty of procedural fairness.

The court also found that the Board's decision was substantively reasonable and that the Board did not create a legitimate expectation that a different process would be followed.

The moving parties brought a motion for leave to appeal the March 2, 2021 decision of McEwan J. The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs in the amount of $5,000 to the responding parties.

The moving parties sought leave to appeal the February 12, 2021 decision of McEwen J. The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs of $5,000 to the respondents.

The moving parties sought leave to appeal the January 11, 2021 decision of Boswell J. The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs to the responding parties.

This endorsement concerns the award of costs following the dismissal of a proceeding against all defendants under Rule 2.1.01(1) of the Rules of Civil Procedure.

The plaintiffs' claims were found to be frivolous, vexatious, and an abuse of process, including serious allegations of fraud, theft, and professional misconduct.

The defendants sought substantial indemnity costs, arguing that such an elevated award was justified to discourage fruitless litigation and inappropriate conduct, particularly in cases involving Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Argument (OPCA) concepts.

The court agreed, finding that substantial indemnity costs were warranted given the nature of the dismissed claims and the plaintiffs' conduct, and awarded specific amounts to the defendants.

The member was found to have engaged in professional misconduct.

On the day scheduled for the penalty phase of the hearing, the member's counsel brought a motion to adjourn because the member had terminated his retainer the day before.

The College did not oppose the motion.

The Discipline Committee granted the adjournment, finding that it would be unfair to proceed without affording the member an opportunity to seek new legal counsel, and scheduled a set date hearing.

The defendants brought a motion to set aside a default judgment obtained by the plaintiff for unauthorized shipping charges.

The court applied the five-factor test for setting aside a default judgment.

The court found that the defendants did not bring the motion promptly, deliberately evaded service and ignored the litigation, and failed to present an arguable defence on the merits.

The motion to set aside the default judgment was dismissed.

The applicant appealed a Master's orders striking portions of her notice of motion and awarding substantial indemnity costs to the respondent.

The Superior Court dismissed the appeal, finding it was filed out of time without a motion for an extension.

Furthermore, the court held that the Master made no palpable and overriding error in striking claims for costs against opposing counsel and unparticularized allegations of professional misconduct.

Leave to appeal the costs decision was also denied, and partial indemnity costs of the appeal were awarded to the respondent.

Catalyst Capital Group Inc. attempted to acquire VimpelCom Ltd.'s interest in Wind Mobile Corp. but negotiations failed.

During negotiations, a junior analyst employed by Catalyst left to work for West Face Capital Inc., a member of a consortium that subsequently acquired Wind.

Catalyst sued the former employee and West Face for breach of confidence and other claims (the Moyse Action).

The trial judge dismissed the action, finding that no confidential information was communicated and that Catalyst suffered no detriment because its own refusal to agree to a break fee and its insistence on regulatory concessions made the deal impossible.

Catalyst then commenced a second action against the consortium members and others alleging breach of confidence, conspiracy, and inducing breach of contract.

The motion judge dismissed the second action as barred by issue estoppel, cause of action estoppel, and as an abuse of process.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding that Catalyst was attempting to relitigate factual findings from the first action and that it could have advanced all claims in the first proceeding.

The defendants/plaintiffs by counterclaim appealed a Master's order granting the plaintiff/defendant by counterclaim leave to issue a third party claim against CBC and CBRE.

The appellants argued that the third party claim for contribution and indemnity was legally untenable.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding that the Master correctly applied the low threshold akin to a motion to strike, and properly concluded that the third party claim was supported by Rules 29.01(b) and (c) based on independent claims for breach of contract and intentional interference with economic relations.

The Ontario College of Teachers brought a discipline proceeding against a member for alleged professional misconduct involving Grade [XXX] female students in Nunavut.

The allegations included inappropriate touching of the students' buttocks and making inappropriate comments such as calling them 'beautiful' and 'babe'.

The member denied the allegations, claiming the students fabricated them out of revenge.

The Discipline Committee found the students' evidence credible and rejected the member's theory.

The Committee concluded that the member engaged in professional misconduct, including sexual, physical, verbal, and psychological abuse, and ordered an interim suspension pending a penalty hearing.

Following a motion to strike improper allegations of fraud from a Notice of Motion, the moving party sought substantial indemnity costs.

The responding party, who was self-represented, continued to cast aspersions on counsel in her costs submissions.

The court awarded substantial indemnity costs of $6,800 to the moving party, noting that such costs are warranted to chastise and deter litigants from making irrelevant and prejudicial allegations against officers of the court.

The court issued amended reasons for decision to address three issues raised by the parties following the release of the original decision.

The court suspended its previous decision on costs to allow the responding party to make written submissions, provided directions for settling the order, and clarified that there was no omission in the order regarding costs against a third party.

The Lawyers Professional Indemnity Company (LawPRO) brought a motion to strike certain paragraphs from Anthea Koon's Notice of Motion.

Ms. Koon's underlying motion sought to set aside previous orders of Justice Matheson and sought personal costs against LawPRO's counsel.

LawPRO argued the impugned paragraphs were scandalous, frivolous, vexatious, and/or an abuse of process.

The Master allowed LawPRO's motion in part, striking allegations related to license suspension issues and certain personal cost claims against counsel, particularly against counsel not involved in the relevant proceedings or for future conduct.

However, allegations related to LawPRO's approach on the application and claims of deprivation of natural justice and procedural fairness were allowed to remain.

Substantial indemnity costs were awarded against Ms. Koon.