Marin Forget

The plaintiff, Shawn Balla, brought a motion to lift the stay of his action imposed by section 17 of the Crown Liability and Proceedings Act.

The motion was heard on January 7, 2025.

The court found that Balla met the test for leave under subsection 17(7) of the Act, establishing both good faith and a reasonable possibility of success in his claim of bad faith against certain defendants.

The court granted leave against those defendants who wrote "responsive" on the Health Care Observation Forms, allowing the action to proceed against them, and provided directions for further disclosure and amendment of the statement of claim.

This motion addressed Security National's request to add additional defendants (People on Bikes, Gordon Townley, and His Majesty the King in Right of Ontario) to an existing third-party claim, almost six years after the incident and after the expiry of the statutory limitation period.

The court determined that the applicable rule for adding parties to an existing claim was Rule 5.04(2), not Rule 29.02(1.2), which required considering prejudice to both the plaintiff and the proposed new parties.

The court found that Security National failed to demonstrate that the information regarding the proposed defendants was not discoverable earlier with due diligence, thus prejudicing the proposed defendants due to the expired limitation period.

Furthermore, the court found that allowing the motion would cause significant delay and increased costs, resulting in actual prejudice to the plaintiff, Erin Townley, who has suffered serious injuries and seeks closure.

The court also noted the questionable merit of the claim against uninsured proposed parties.

Consequently, Security National's motion was denied.

This motion concerned the defendants' application to set aside a noting of default in a simplified procedure action.

The court reviewed the defendants' extensive and unexplained delays in filing a defence, noting a pattern of missed deadlines and a two-month delay in retaining new counsel after terminating previous counsel.

Despite the general preference for resolving disputes on their merits, the court found the defendants' conduct demonstrated "shocking laxity" and deliberate delay.

The motion to set aside the noting of default was dismissed, with costs awarded to the plaintiff.

The plaintiff, Patrick Lyng, sued Ontario Place Corporation under the Occupiers' Liability Act for a serious knee injury sustained after a concert.

The injury occurred when he fell down a wet, grassy hill after a pedestrian bridge, the shortest route to the Go Station, was closed.

The court found Ontario Place Corporation 75% liable for failing to take reasonable care by not providing adequate warnings or barriers for the known hazardous hill, especially given the wet conditions and the presence of intoxicated patrons.

The plaintiff was found 25% contributorily negligent for jumping down the hill while intoxicated and wearing flip-flops.

The court awarded damages for non-pecuniary loss, past income loss, and future loss of competitive advantage, totaling $131,525.41 before prejudgment interest, reduced by the plaintiff's contributory negligence.

This endorsement addresses the costs of two successful motions brought by the plaintiffs, Barry Picov and Picov Farms Ltd. The first motion sought to amend their Statement of Claim to substitute Robar Residence Corporation as plaintiff, and the second sought to set aside an ex parte costs order against them in favour of Genserve Systems Inc. The court awarded partial indemnity costs to the plaintiffs for both aspects of their motion, finding that while the plaintiffs' counsel bore some responsibility for the initial error and evidential record, the defendants' opposition was not entirely justified, particularly Genserve's stance on setting aside the ex parte order.

Total costs of $19,689 were awarded to the plaintiffs, apportioned among the defendants.

The Plaintiff sought an order finding the L'vova Defendants (Aida L'vova and Yuri Kulinich) in contempt for breaching various court orders, including a Mareva injunction, an order for accounting, and an order to pay $700,000 into court.

The court found both Aida and Yuri in contempt, concluding they knowingly and deliberately acted to hide funds and defy court orders.

Aida directed the transfer of $700,000 to her son, who then transferred it to Yuri, who claimed to have used it for gambling debts.

The court imposed an initial 2-day detention, followed by an 88-day intermittent (weekend) incarceration if the $700,000 is not paid into court by mid-September 2018, emphasizing deterrence, denunciation, and coercion.