R.P. Armstrong

The parties separated in 1998.

The respondent commenced an action in 1999, and the appellant counterclaimed for spousal support and other relief.

The action was dismissed for delay in 2003.

In 2011, the appellant commenced a new application for spousal support and other relief.

The motion judge stayed the entire application, finding the spousal support claim was statute-barred under the former Limitations Act.

The Court of Appeal upheld the finding that the spousal support claim was statute-barred, subject to the appellant's right to seek an extension under s. 2(8) of the Family Law Act.

However, the Court allowed the appeal in part, lifting the stay on the other claims for relief and referring them back to the motion judge, as only interim spousal support was before the court.

Following the certification of a class action on behalf of franchisees against a franchisor, a group of franchisees opposed to the action waged a campaign encouraging others to opt out.

The motion judge invalidated the opt-out notices received after the campaign began, finding the campaign coercive and misleading.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that the motion judge erred in drawing an inference of intimidation without direct evidence and in holding the opposing franchisees to a standard of objectivity.

The communications amounted to acceptable intra-class debate, and the opt-out notices were reinstated.

The Registrar of the Alcohol and Gaming Commission applied to revoke a liquor licence held by a full-patch member of the Hells Angels.

The board dismissed the application, and the Divisional Court affirmed.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal found that the board erred in law by applying a 'balance of probabilities' standard instead of the lower 'reasonable grounds for belief' standard required by s. 6(2)(d) of the Liquor Licence Act.

The board also misconstrued the test by improperly limiting its analysis of the licensee's past conduct to his operation of the business and requiring evidence of past criminal activity.

The appeal was allowed and the matter remitted to the board for reconsideration.

The appellant municipality appealed a decision declaring that the respondent landowners could enforce a 1953 agreement in which the municipality agreed to perpetually maintain a storm sewer drainage system.

The municipality argued the claim was statute-barred because previous landowners had accepted its anticipatory repudiation of the agreement by their inaction, and that the respondents lacked privity of contract.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that mere inaction does not constitute acceptance of a repudiatory breach.

Furthermore, the respondents had standing to enforce the agreement as successors in title under the agreement's enurement clause and the principled exception to the privity of contract doctrine.

The appellants and respondent held equal interests in a limited partnership formed to develop a property.

After their relationship soured, the appellants offered to sell their interest to the respondent.

The respondent accepted the offer while secretly negotiating to sell the entire property to a third party at a profit.

The appellants sued for breach of fiduciary duty and breach of the limited partnership agreement.

The Court of Appeal upheld the motion judge's dismissal of the action, finding that the presumption of a fiduciary duty was rebutted because both parties were acting in their own self-interest with the knowledge that the partnership was ending.

The appellant was arrested for armed robbery.

Incident to his arrest, police conducted a pat-down search and seized his unlocked cellphone, briefly examining its contents and finding incriminating photos and a text message.

At the police station, the appellant was left alone for five hours before being interviewed, during which time he confessed.

The trial judge admitted the cellphone evidence, finding the search was a lawful search incident to arrest, and admitted the confession under s. 24(2) of the Charter despite an inadvertent breach of the appellant's right to counsel.

The Court of Appeal upheld the convictions, declining to carve out a cellphone exception to the common law doctrine of search incident to arrest.

A guest at the appellant's resort drowned in an unattended indoor swimming pool.

A Ministry of Labour inspector ordered the resort to report the death under s. 51(1) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, which requires reporting when a person is killed or critically injured from any cause at a workplace.

The Ontario Labour Relations Board and the Divisional Court upheld the order, finding the pool was a workplace because employees sometimes worked there.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, holding that this interpretation was unreasonable as it would lead to absurd results.

The Court held that s. 51(1) requires a reasonable nexus between the hazard giving rise to the death or injury and a realistic risk to worker safety at the site.

The appellants obtained judgments in the United States against the Islamic Republic of Iran and its agencies for kidnapping, detention, and torture.

They brought an action in Ontario to enforce those judgments.

The motion judge dismissed the action on the basis that the defendants were immune from jurisdiction under the State Immunity Act.

On appeal, the appellants argued that the acts constituted commercial activity, that a common law exception applied, and that the defendants lost immunity by violating jus cogens norms.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the State Immunity Act is a complete code, the acts were not commercial, and customary international law does not recognize a jus cogens exception to state immunity.

The appellant was convicted of drug offences after being found with cocaine and cash.

During deliberations, the jury asked a question about whether they could draw an adverse inference from the absence of witnesses to corroborate the appellant's explanation for the cash.

Before the trial judge answered the question, the jury indicated they had reached a verdict, which the judge accepted without answering the question.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial, holding that the trial judge erred by failing to instruct the jury that they should attach no evidentiary significance to the appellant's failure to call witnesses, as the question reflected a potential misapprehension of the burden of proof.