Paul V. Lomic

The plaintiff brought a motion under Rule 30.06 for a further and better affidavit of documents, seeking financial, operational, and accounting records from the defendants.

The underlying action involved claims of partnership dissolution, breach of contract, and intellectual property infringement.

The defendants opposed the motion, arguing the documents were irrelevant, not proven to exist, and disproportionate to produce at this stage.

The court found the requested documents were relevant to both liability and damages, and that the plaintiff had provided sufficient evidence of their existence.

The court rejected the defendants' proportionality arguments, noting they failed to provide evidence of undue burden, and granted the motion with costs.

The applicant successfully applied to enforce a $2 million judgment from a United States District Court against the respondent.

Following the decision, the applicant sought substantial indemnity costs of $33,373.40.

The court awarded the requested costs on a substantial indemnity basis due to the applicant's unaccepted Rule 49 offer to settle and the respondent's unfounded allegations of fraud against the applicant's foreign counsel.

The applicant, Dead End Survival, LLC, sought to enforce a foreign judgment from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia Atlanta Division, which included a permanent injunction and statutory damages for trademark infringement.

The respondent raised preliminary objections regarding the form of proceeding (application vs. action) and substantive defenses of fraud and public policy (excessive damages).

The court dismissed the preliminary objection, finding an application appropriate due to no material factual disputes.

The court also rejected the fraud defense, noting the allegations were not new and could have been raised in the foreign proceedings, and the public policy defense, affirming that foreign damages exceeding Canadian awards do not inherently violate public policy.

The application to enforce the foreign judgment was granted.

The applicant, Dead End Survival, LLC, sought to enforce a judgment from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia Atlanta Division against the respondent, Georgi Marhasin (operating as Marhasin Warehouse).

The foreign judgment included a permanent injunction and damages for trademark infringement, unfair competition, fraud, and other torts.

The respondent raised a preliminary objection that the matter should have proceeded by action, not application, and defended on grounds of fraud and public policy (excessive statutory damages).

The court dismissed the preliminary objection, finding an application appropriate due to no material factual disputes.

The court also rejected the fraud defence, noting the respondent's failure to defend in the foreign proceedings and the lack of new material facts.

The public policy defence regarding excessive damages was also dismissed, as U.S. trademark law was not contrary to Canadian justice, and the defence does not bar enforcement merely because damages differ from Canadian awards.

The application to enforce the foreign judgment was granted.

The plaintiff, Aon Benfield Canada ULC, sought an award of costs following a proceeding that involved an interim injunction, an interlocutory injunction, and a settlement of the action.

The defendant, Aamir Vazir, a former employee, had misappropriated highly sensitive proprietary software ("PathWise") and attempted to erase evidence.

The court granted the injunctions and the action settled, with costs being the only outstanding issue.

Aon Benfield sought $269,463.89 in costs, including significant disbursements for technical support.

Vazir opposed, arguing issues related to the plaintiff's conduct and the proportionality of the costs.

The court found the hours worked by the plaintiff's counsel not excessive given the case's importance and Vazir's egregious conduct.

However, to balance the indemnity principle with access to justice and avoid a "chilling effect" the court reduced the legal fees by $20,000, awarding Aon Benfield $249,463.89, payable within 90 days.

The court heard three procedural motions in a $100 million commercial dispute involving allegations of breach of contract and breach of confidence.

The defendants moved to compel the plaintiffs to answer undertakings and refusals from discovery, which the court largely granted, ordering the plaintiffs to provide development timelines and material facts supporting their group enterprise claims.

The plaintiffs brought two motions: one to strike the defendants' response to a request to admit an incomplete affidavit, and another to compel updated answers regarding expert witnesses.

The court dismissed both of the plaintiffs' motions, noting the defendants' ongoing obligation to correct discovery answers under the Rules of Civil Procedure.

Following the dismissal of a motion for partial summary judgment in an intellectual property dispute, the court determined the appropriate costs award.

The successful plaintiffs sought elevated costs exceeding $200,000, alleging the motion was unreasonable.

The court held that although the motion was aggressive, it was not unreasonable and costs should therefore be awarded on a partial indemnity basis.

After reviewing hourly rates, fees, and disbursements under Rule 57.01(1) of the Rules of Civil Procedure, several claimed amounts were reduced, including photocopying, travel expenses, and expert-related disbursements.

The court fixed total costs at $137,382 inclusive of fees, disbursements, and taxes.

The defendants brought a motion for partial summary judgment to dismiss the claims against three of the four corporate defendants, arguing they were not parties to the relevant agreements and that the 'group enterprise' doctrine does not exist in Canadian law.

The court found that the 'group enterprise' concept exists as a carefully limited exception to the corporate veil principle.

Given the complex evidence of inter-corporate connections and the equitable breach of confidence claims, the court concluded there were genuine issues requiring trial and declined to use its enhanced fact-finding powers.

The motion for partial summary judgment was dismissed.

This costs endorsement addressed two prior motions in a commercial action involving confidential technology documents and discovery management.

The court held that the defendants were entirely successful on their protective order motion and awarded them partial indemnity costs, while reducing the amount sought because the use of four lawyers created some duplication.

On the plaintiffs' motion concerning a discovery plan, further and better affidavit of documents, and case management, the court found mixed success because some relief advancing the litigation was granted but core discovery-plan relief was refused as premature.

Costs of that motion were ordered to be in the cause.

The plaintiffs moved for a discovery plan, further documentary production, and case management in a commercial dispute involving confidentiality obligations and alleged independent creation of a product.

The court held that a contested discovery plan should not be imposed before pleadings and related procedural motions were finalized, and emphasized that parties must first make meaningful efforts to agree on a plan under Rule 29.1.03.

The court gave procedural guidance on motions required to compel discovery from non-parties or additional witnesses, ordered preservation and third-party document-request steps, and directed that no examinations for discovery proceed until a plan was agreed or ordered.

Given the complexity of the disputes and the parties' inability to cooperate, the action was assigned to case management.

In a commercial dispute alleging misappropriation of confidential information concerning a remote municipal water shut off system, the defendants moved for a protective order governing confidential and highly confidential productions.

The plaintiffs attempted to withdraw prior consent after the defendants designated a very large volume of documents as highly confidential and unavailable to the receiving party.

The court held that consent could not be arbitrarily withdrawn absent evidence of mistake, surprise, or lack of authority, none of which was established on the record.

The protective order was therefore granted, with the court emphasizing that any challenge to particular highly confidential designations had to proceed under the challenge mechanisms built into the order.

The defendants, who were also plaintiffs by counterclaim, sought a confidentiality order requiring certain disclosed materials to be designated “for counsel eyes only.” They argued the information concerned confidential technical, marketing, customer, and financial data of a developing technology company and that disclosure could cause irreparable competitive harm.

The plaintiff opposed the motion, arguing that a discovery plan without confidentiality restrictions had already been executed and that the evidence of harm was speculative.

The court held that the existence of parallel Federal Court litigation with even stricter confidentiality protections justified comparable safeguards in the Superior Court proceeding.

The motion was granted and a confidentiality order issued.