Civil Litigation - Defendant - ODC

The moving party brought a motion for leave to appeal an order of P.W. Nicholson J. and a subsequent costs order.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs of $5,000 to the responding party.

The moving parties brought a motion for leave to appeal from the order of McCarthy J. dated November 12, 2020.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and awarded costs to the responding party in the fixed amount of $5,000.

The moving parties brought a motion for leave to appeal from an order of a Master.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal without costs.

The moving party brought a motion for leave to appeal a costs order made by a Master.

The Divisional Court reviewed the matter in writing.

The motion for leave to appeal was dismissed.

The court awarded costs fixed at $5,000 to the responding parties.

The defendants sought leave to appeal an order granting the plaintiffs leave to amend their statement of claim, arguing the new claims were statute-barred.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal, clarifying that because the motions judge did not finally dispose of the limitations defence, the order was interlocutory.

The defendants remain free to plead the limitations defence in response to the amended claim at trial.

The moving party brought a motion for leave to appeal an order dismissing a motion to void a lease in the context of an oppression application under the Canada Business Corporations Act.

The Divisional Court directed the parties to provide further written submissions on whether the court has jurisdiction to hear the appeal in light of s. 249 of the Act, or alternatively, whether the underlying order was final and therefore appealable to the Court of Appeal rather than the Divisional Court.

The applicant, an advocacy group for strippers, brought a preliminary motion for an order permitting the anonymization of affidavits to be sworn by strippers in support of an application for judicial review challenging COVID-19 regulations.

The applicant argued that publicly identifying the affiants would put their economic and family safety at risk due to the stigma associated with their occupation.

Applying the Dagenais/Mentuck test, the court found that the applicant established a serious risk to the administration of justice and that there was no reasonable alternative to the order.

The court granted the motion, allowing the use of non-identifying initials in publicly available documents, provided that the respondent and the court have access to the affiants' full names in a sealed record.

The moving party brought a motion to dismiss the responding party's appeal for delay.

The responding party had failed to perfect his appeal within the required time after receiving trial transcripts and failed to attend a scheduled case conference.

The court found that while the responding party may not intend to pursue the appeal, he should be given a final opportunity to perfect it.

The court ordered the responding party to perfect the appeal by a specified date, failing which the moving party could obtain an order dismissing the appeal.

The landlord brought a motion to require the tenants to pay rent arrears and ongoing rent as a condition of maintaining the statutory stay of an eviction order pending their appeal to the Divisional Court.

The landlord also sought security for costs.

The court found that the tenants' failure to pay rent while enjoying the protection of the statutory stay amounted to an abuse of process.

The court ordered the tenants to pay the outstanding arrears and ongoing rent to maintain the stay, but dismissed the request for security for costs to avoid unfairly burdening the tenants.

The appellants appealed an interlocutory order dismissing their motion to strike the respondent's counterclaim for defamation and civil conspiracy.

The respondent, a former condominium board member, alleged he was the victim of a smear campaign orchestrated by the appellants that led to his removal from the board.

The Divisional Court allowed the appeal and struck the counterclaim without leave to amend.

The Court held that the respondent failed to plead a prima facie case of defamation against any specific individual, which is a prerequisite to relying on the modern, relaxed approach to defamation pleadings.

The civil conspiracy claim was also struck as it was entirely duplicative of the defective defamation claim.

The plaintiffs commenced an occupiers' liability action after one plaintiff allegedly struck her head on a staircase in the defendants' building.

At a pre-trial conference, the pre-trial judge ordered the appointment of a court expert to report on liability and human factors, despite objections from the defendants and the plaintiffs' objection to paying the costs.

The pre-trial judge provided no reasons for the order.

The defendants appealed.

The Divisional Court allowed the appeal and set aside the order, holding that the pre-trial judge erred by failing to provide reasons and by issuing an order that required the expert to investigate and weigh evidence, thereby usurping the role of the trier of fact.

The applicant brought a refusals motion in the context of an application for judicial review of decisions denying it financial support under an agricultural risk management program.

The applicant sought to compel the decision-makers to answer questions about who authored the decisions and who was involved in the deliberative process, arguing this was necessary to advance its claim of a denial of natural justice.

The court dismissed the motion, finding the questions were irrelevant to the pleaded natural justice ground and amounted to an unwarranted fishing expedition into deliberative privilege.

Following a successful appeal by the self-represented appellants, the Divisional Court determined the costs for both the Small Claims Court trial and the appeal.

The court applied the principles from Fong v. Chan, finding that the self-represented appellants were entitled to costs because they demonstrated an opportunity cost by foregoing remunerative activity to prepare for the appeal.

The respondent was ordered to pay a total of $14,512.32 in costs and disbursements to the appellants.

The applicants sought judicial review of a decision by the Minister of the Environment revoking their authority for a wind farm project.

Three procedural motions were brought: CanWEA sought leave to intervene as a friend of the court, the Landowners sought leave to intervene as parties, and the respondent moved to strike fresh evidence filed by the applicants.

The court granted CanWEA leave to intervene, denied the Landowners leave to intervene without prejudice to their right to bring a separate application, and adjourned the motion to strike evidence to the panel hearing the underlying application.

The appellant appealed a Small Claims Court judgment ordering it to pay $25,000 in unpaid fees to the respondent.

The appellant argued it was denied procedural fairness because the Deputy Judge failed to read its lengthy written closing submissions before rendering the decision, and that the reasons provided were insufficient.

The Divisional Court agreed on both grounds, finding a clear denial of procedural fairness and that the brief reasons provided were incapable of meaningful appellate review.

The appeal was allowed and a new trial was ordered.

The moving party brought a motion to set aside the Registrar's order dismissing his appeal for delay.

The moving party had been found guilty of professional misconduct for knowingly assisting in mortgage fraud, resulting in the revocation of his license to practice law.

The court found the moving party's reasons for delay uncompelling but noted there was no prejudice to the respondent.

The court granted the motion and set aside the Registrar's order on strict terms, requiring the appeal to be perfected within 21 days.

The appellant private school appealed a Small Claims Court decision awarding tuition refunds to three international students who transferred to another school shortly after beginning their second year of study.

The trial judge found that the students had entered into new contracts for their second year and were unaware of the school's no-refund policy.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding no legal error in the trial judge's conclusion that the refund policy was not part of the contract and that the students were entitled to refunds.

Despite dismissing the appeal, the court awarded $5,000 in costs to the appellant due to the significant time spent trying to serve the respondents, to be set off against the trial judgment.

The appellant appealed a Small Claims Court judgment finding him liable for credit card debt.

While conceding liability for one card, he disputed liability for a VISA Gold Card on which he was a secondary card holder, arguing his ex-wife opened the account and he never signed the application.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the trial judge's conclusion that the appellant's admitted use of the card rendered him liable for the balance.

Costs of $3,500 were awarded to the respondent.

The appellant, counsel for plaintiffs in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement proceedings, appealed a decision of the Eastern Administrative Judge refusing to recuse himself from determining a request for costs against her personally.

The Divisional Court found that the judge's prior direction, which contained substantive findings against the appellant without notice or opportunity to respond, created a reasonable apprehension of bias.

The appeal was allowed, the costs orders were set aside, and the costs matter was remanded to a different judge.

The self-represented appellant brought a motion under Rule 61.09(4) of the Rules of Civil Procedure seeking to perfect her appeal from a Small Claims Court decision without filing a trial transcript.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion, finding that the appellant failed to demonstrate that her appeal had apparent merit or that it could be appropriately argued without a transcript, given the nature of the evidentiary errors alleged.

Costs of $600 were awarded to the respondent.