Court of Appeal for Ontario

Date: February 27, 2019 Docket: C65836

Judges: Feldman, Brown and Miller JJ.A.

Between

Rawia Salman Plaintiff (Appellant)

and

Robert Ipacs and Ipacs Law Office Defendants (Respondents)

Counsel

Rawia Salman, in person

Louis P. Covens, for the respondents

Heard: February 22, 2019

On appeal from: the order of Justice David Broad of the Superior Court of Justice, dated August 9, 2018.

Reasons for Decision

[1] The appellant brought an action against the respondent lawyer and his law firm, alleging they were negligent in counselling her to accept an improvident settlement of a tort claim arising from a motor vehicle accident.

[2] The action was dismissed on a motion for summary judgment. The motion judge found that the appellant was not coerced into settlement, and that the respondent lawyer explained to her his reasons for recommending the settlement before having her sign a release, and then had her sign a second release two weeks later after she expressed reservations. The motion judge found that the decision to recommend the settlement could not be assailed, and that based on the evidence before him, the settlement "was far from improvident, but rather was favourable to the [appellant] and in her best interests."

[3] Before this court, the appellant did not identify an error by the motion judge with respect to this issue.

[4] The appellant also argued that the motion judge erred in not addressing her claim that the respondents were negligent in not reporting two other settlements (one from a slip and fall claim and one from a long term disability claim) to the Ontario Disability Support Program ("ODSP"). The failure to report, she argued, caused her to encounter problems with the ODSP, which required some effort on her part to correct.

[5] The motion judge was unable to find, on the evidence before him, that what he referred to as the appellant's "encounters with the ODSP", resulted from any negligence on the part of the respondents. We see no error in this conclusion.

Disposition

[6] The appeal is dismissed. The respondents are entitled to costs of the appeal in the amount of $4,000, inclusive of HST and disbursements.

K. Feldman J.A.

David Brown J.A.

B.W. Miller J.A.