Civil Litigation - Defendant - OCA

This is a costs endorsement on appeal from a jury trial judgment in a historical sexual assault case.

The appellant challenged the jury instruction on loss of income damages, the punitive damages award, and the prejudgment interest rate.

The Court of Appeal upheld the entitlement to and quantum of damages for loss of income and punitive damages but reversed the prejudgment interest award.

The respondent sought substantial indemnity costs of $179,660.31, relying on a presumption under the Victims' Bill of Rights.

The court awarded substantial indemnity costs of $100,000, finding that the full amount sought would not be in the interests of justice, particularly given the disproportionate relationship between trial costs and appeal costs.

The appellants appealed a trial judge's decision rejecting their claim against the respondent regarding an alleged representation about the location and configuration of basketball seats purchased under a licence.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the trial judge's findings that the licence contained no such representations and that no oral representations were made.

The appeal was dismissed with costs awarded to the respondent.

The appellant was injured in a motor vehicle accident and subsequently applied for non-earner benefits after initially returning to work.

The motion judge dismissed her action on summary judgment, concluding that because she was employed at the time of the accident, she could not qualify for non-earner benefits.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that under the Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule, a claimant's employment status at the time of the accident does not automatically render them ineligible for non-earner benefits.

The court found that a claimant who is able to work may still suffer a complete inability to carry on a normal life, and remitted the matter to the trial court.

The appellants appealed a jury verdict in a fatal motor vehicle accident action, arguing the trial judge erred in his instructions on the duty of a driver entering a highway, failed to instruct the jury on the range of damages for loss of guidance, care, and companionship, and that the damages awarded were excessive.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, noting the appellants' failure to object to the jury charge at trial.

The Court held that while the damages awarded were high, they were not so inordinately high as to warrant appellate intervention.

The plaintiff sued the property owner and the winter maintenance contractor after slipping on black ice.

The contractor had breached its service contract by failing to name the property owner as an additional insured on its liability policy.

The motion judge ordered the contractor to defend and indemnify the property owner.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal set aside the order, holding that the indemnification order was premature and that the breach of the insurance obligation gave rise to a remedy in damages for defence costs, not a duty to defend.

The contractor was ordered to pay the property owner's defence costs, except those incurred exclusively to defend claims not arising from the contractor's performance of the contract.

The appellants appealed an order striking portions of their claim against Carleton University and several of its employees.

The motion judge had struck the Charter claims, finding the university was not implementing a specific government program when booking space for non-academic extra-curricular use, and struck the negligence claims against the individual employees.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, agreeing that the university's actions did not attract Charter scrutiny under the Eldridge test, and that the pleadings failed to establish that the individual employees exhibited a separate identity or interest from the university to attract personal liability.

The respondent sued the appellant bank in conversion after a fraudulent employee deposited $4,000,000 in forged cheques into accounts at the bank.

The appellant sought to amend its statement of defence to plead estoppel by negligence, arguing the respondent was negligent in failing to detect the fraud.

The Court of Appeal upheld the lower courts' refusal to allow the amendment, confirming that conversion is a strict liability tort and that recognizing a new duty of care or a defence of estoppel by negligence would inappropriately alter the allocation of risk in the banking system.

The appeal was allowed only to the extent of permitting the appellant to plead defences arising from the respondent's actual knowledge of the fraud.

The appellants appealed a trial judgment dismissing their action to discharge a debenture registered against their land.

The trial judge had found that while the ten-year limitation period under the Limitations Act had expired, equitable considerations prevented the appellants from succeeding.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that the trial judge erred by deciding the case on equitable grounds that were neither pleaded nor argued.

Furthermore, the Court held that equitable considerations cannot trump the clear statutory language of sections 4 and 15 of the Limitations Act, which extinguish the right and title to land after ten years.

The debenture was ordered discharged.

The representative plaintiff brought a proposed class action against the defendant bank for unpaid overtime, alleging breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and negligence due to systemic policies requiring pre-approval for overtime and inadequate record-keeping.

The motion judge certified the action, and the Divisional Court upheld the certification.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal upheld the certification of most common issues and agreed that a class proceeding was the preferable procedure.

However, the Court allowed the appeal in part, striking the common issue regarding the aggregate assessment of damages under s. 24(1) of the Class Proceedings Act, finding that damages could not reasonably be calculated without proof by individual class members.

The plaintiff brought a proposed class action alleging that the defendant railway company misclassified first line supervisors as managerial employees to avoid paying overtime under the Canada Labour Code.

The motion judge certified the action but significantly redrafted the common issues, rejecting the plaintiff's proposed misclassification issue due to a lack of commonality.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal held that the motion judge correctly rejected the misclassification issue because individualized assessments of job duties were required.

However, the Court found the motion judge erred in certifying a reframed common issue about the minimum requirements for managerial status, as it suffered from the same lack of commonality.

The certification order was set aside.

The moving parties (respondents on appeal) brought a motion to quash the appellants' appeal from an order dismissing their motion to strike a statement of claim.

The moving parties argued the order was interlocutory.

The Court of Appeal held that because the motion judge dismissed the appellants' motion to strike the entire action for lack of jurisdiction, the order finally determined a substantive right and was therefore a final order.

The motion to quash the appeal was dismissed.

The City of Windsor appealed a Divisional Court decision upholding an Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) award for the expropriation of the respondents' lands.

The OMB had determined the market value of the expropriated lands and awarded injurious affection damages for the remaining lands based on an expropriation scheme dating back to 1983.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the OMB unreasonably failed to consider the negative impact of the 1996 Provincial Policy Statement (PPS) on the lands' market value, as the PPS was not part of the expropriation scheme.

Furthermore, the OMB erred in law by assessing injurious affection damages based on the entire expropriation scheme rather than limiting them to the diminution in value caused specifically by the City's acquisition of the lands.

A new hearing was ordered.

The insured was sued for negligent misrepresentation in a seller property information statement, with the plaintiff claiming damages for repair costs and health consequences.

The insurer appealed an application judge's finding that it had a duty to defend the entire action under the insured's homeowner's policy.

The Court of Appeal upheld the finding that the health consequences constituted 'Bodily Injury' triggering a duty to defend, rejecting the argument that the claim was merely derivative of the economic loss claim.

However, the Court allowed the appeal in part, holding that the insurer should not be responsible for 100 per cent of the defence costs since the covered claims represented only a small portion of the total damages claimed.

The appellant appealed a summary judgment dismissing her action to invalidate a home renovations contract and associated loan agreement.

She alleged her signatures on the contract were forged.

The Court of Appeal upheld the motion judge's finding that there was no genuine issue requiring a trial, noting the appellant failed to provide corroborative evidence of forgery to counter the respondent's contemporaneous documentary evidence.

The appeal was dismissed with costs.

The plaintiffs brought a proposed class action against mutual fund managers for permitting market timing, which allegedly caused losses to long-term investors.

The defendants had previously entered into settlement agreements with the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) regarding the same conduct.

The motion judge dismissed the certification motion, finding the OSC proceedings were the preferable procedure.

The Divisional Court allowed the plaintiffs' appeal.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the defendants' appeal, holding that the OSC proceedings were regulatory and lacked participatory rights for investors, and therefore did not fulfill the access to justice goals of the Class Proceedings Act.

The class action was deemed the preferable procedure.

The appellant appealed a trial judgment awarding the respondent $919,237 in damages following a rear-end motor vehicle collision.

The appellant argued the trial judge erred by discharging the jury at the outset of the trial and by improperly quantifying damages, given the respondent's severe pre-existing fibromyalgia.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the trial judge's decision to strike the jury due to the anticipated complexity of the medical and economic evidence was not arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable.

The Court also found no basis to interfere with the trial judge's assessment of damages, which was grounded in the evidence.

The Court of Appeal issued an endorsement regarding the costs of an appeal and a motion in the Superior Court.

The court ordered that the appellant, the Attorney General of Canada, be awarded costs in the cause in both courts, fixed at a total amount of $35,000 inclusive of disbursements and taxes.

The appellants appealed the dismissal of their personal injury action.

The trial judge dismissed the action after the appellant failed to proceed on the fourth scheduled trial date, having discharged multiple lawyers and appearing without counsel or her file despite a previous order that the trial would proceed with or without counsel.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the trial judge's exercise of discretion to refuse another adjournment and dismiss the action.

The appellant appealed a decision regarding adverse possession of a disputed strip of land between two properties.

The Court of Appeal upheld the application judge's finding that the respondent regularly used the disputed strip at the front of the houses, defeating the claim for adverse possession there.

However, the Court found that the application judge failed to address the back of the house, where a fence excluded the respondent and established exclusive possession for the appellant.

The judgments were amended accordingly, with costs awarded to the respondent who was substantially successful.

The purchasers (respondents) entered into an agreement to buy a residential property from the vendor (appellant), conditional upon a satisfactory home inspection in the purchasers' sole and absolute discretion.

After receiving an inspection report identifying several deficiencies, the purchasers decided not to waive the condition and requested the return of their deposit.

The vendor refused, arguing the purchasers did not act reasonably or in good faith.

The Court of Appeal upheld the trial judge's decision ordering the return of the deposit, finding that the inspection condition imported both objective and subjective elements, and that the purchasers exercised their discretion honestly, in good faith, and reasonably based on the inspection report.