Derenzis v. Gore Mutual Insurance Company, 2023 ONSC 6266
DIVISIONAL COURT FILE NO.: 545/23, 546/23
SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE – ONTARIO
DIVISIONAL COURT
RE: LUCIA DERENZIS, Appellant/Applicant
AND: GORE MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY AND LICENCE APPEAL TRIBUNAL, Respondents
BEFORE: Matheson J.
COUNSEL: Joseph Campisi and Ashu Ismail, for the Appellant/Applicant
Arthur Camporese, for the Respondent Gore Mutual Insurance Company
Valerie Crystal, for the Licence Appeal Tribunal
HEARD at Toronto: In Writing.
ENDORSEMENT
1A notice of appeal and notice of application for judicial review, dated September 27, 2023, have been delivered on behalf of Lucia Derenzis. These proceedings seek to quash the interlocutory decisions of the Licence Appeal Tribunal (“LAT”) dated September 11, 2023 (“first order”) and September 18, 2023 (“second order”) both dated as released on September 20, 2023 (the “Decisions”). The orders at issue appear in both the first and second order.
2This Court has since commenced the process under r. 2.1.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure as set out in the following directions:
The Registrar is directed to send a notice under r. 2.1 of the Rules of Civil Proceedings in these matters due to the following issues:
There is no right of appeal from an interlocutory order of LAT
There is no apparent basis to avoid the prematurity doctrine, with one exception addressed below [with respect to the application for judicial review]
Exception: The 2.1 notice for [the application for judicial review] will exclude that part of the application for judicial review seeking to quash the orders in paras. 38-40 of the [second] September 20, 2023 decision, regarding the destruction of documents.
3I note that the orders at issue appear at different paragraph numbers in the first and second orders,. The orders at paras. 37-41 in the second order also appear at paras. 36-40 in the first order. In response to the notice under r. 2.1, the Appellant/Applicant has clarified this overlap as well as the specific paragraphs intended to be at issue. In the above directions and in this endorsement, I have used one set of paragraph numbers, from the second order. However, these reasons, and the prior directions, apply to the parallel orders in the first order as well.
4This Court has already excluded the orders as set out in paras. 38-40 of the second order from the r. 2.1 process for the application for judicial review. Those orders require the destruction of certain documents, prohibit dissemination, and require confirmation of compliance. As set out in this Court’s directions, the application for judicial review of those orders has been permitted to move forward, and interim terms have been imposed.
5The Appellant/Applicant seeks to challenge three orders that do not form part of the above exception, at set out in paras. 36, 37 and 41 of the second order. Paragraph 41 requires that the witness, whose evidence is the focus of the issues in the Decisions, also destroy her documents, not disseminate them and confirm that she has done so. That paragraph shall be added to the orders that form the exception to the r. 2.1 process for the application for judicial review.
1The remaining two orders at issue, at paras. 36 and 37, are orders that strike out certain evidence from the LAT record and provide for the preparation of redacted materials for use in the ongoing LAT proceedings.
2Subrule 2.1.01(1) authorizes the court to dismiss an appeal or application as frivolous or vexatious or otherwise an abuse of the process of the court. However, r. 2.1 should only be used for “the clearest of cases”: Scaduto v. The Law Society of Upper Canada, 2015 ONCA 733, at para. 8. This is a clear case.
3Beginning with the appeal, the issue is jurisdiction. This court has determined, in Penney v. The Co-operators General Insurance Company, 2022 ONSC 3874, that there is no right of appeal from an interlocutory decision of LAT. All of the orders that the Appellant/Applicant seeks to challenge on the appeal are interlocutory. The LAT proceedings are ongoing. After the parties complete the LAT proceedings, if the Appellant/Applicant is dissatisfied with the final LAT decision, an appeal may be brought at that time.
4The Appellant/Applicant submits that the issues on the appeal are intertwined with those on the application for judicial review and should be permitted to move forward. The Appellant/Applicant also submits that judicial review is difficult, expensive and may be a losing proposition. None of these submissions create appellate jurisdiction.
5The appeal is therefore dismissed for want of jurisdiction.
6Moving to the application for judicial review, this r. 2.1 process only applies to the attempt to challenge the orders that strike out certain evidence and provide for the preparation and use of redacted materials in the ongoing LAT proceedings. The Appellant/Applicant has put forward no submissions that could amount to the exceptional circumstances needed to persuade the Court to hear a premature application for judicial review on those evidentiary rulings.
7Therefore, the application for judicial review of the orders in paras. 36 and 37 of the second order and the parallel paragraphs in the first order is also dismissed.
8The Appellant/Applicant shall deliver an amended application for judicial review within 30 days from today, limited in accordance with this endorsement. Within two weeks from delivery of that amended application, the parties shall submit a fresh agreed, or proposed, schedule(s), for the exchange of court documents in relation to the amended application for judicial review, as well as a fresh list of any preliminary issues.
Matheson J.
Date: November 14, 2023