Salmers

The plaintiff, a minor who suffered a catastrophic brain injury, brought a basket motion for approval of a multi-million dollar settlement of her tort and accident benefit claims.

The court identified numerous concerns, including potential conflicts of interest arising from plaintiff's counsel also representing the minor's father (a defendant in the tort action), commingling of expenses, proposed payment of loans to the father from the minor's settlement funds, and lack of detail regarding disbursements and fees.

The court declined to approve the settlement, ordered further evidence to address these concerns, and referred the matter to the Children's Lawyer for a report.

The applicant medical centre sought to vary a production order requiring it to produce a patient's medical records, including insulin pump data stored on a third-party website.

The Crown argued the centre had possession and control of the data because it had the patient's permission to access the website.

The Superior Court of Justice held that the centre did not possess or control the data on the third-party website at the time it received the order, as it only accessed the data during patient visits.

The application was granted and the production order was varied to exclude the requirement to obtain data from the third-party website.

The plaintiff brought an action against his neighbour for nuisance, negligence, and strict liability, alleging that the neighbour's dumping of thousands of truckloads of fill, alteration of drainage, and failure to maintain a culvert caused extensive and continuous flooding on the plaintiff's property.

The court found the defendant liable under all three causes of action, noting the defendant's conduct was high-handed and reprehensible.

The court awarded the plaintiff $250,000 for loss of use and enjoyment, $15,000 for property damage, and $125,000 in punitive damages.

The court also issued a mandatory injunction requiring the defendant to rectify the drainage issues and dismissed the defendant's counterclaims as utterly without merit.

The applicants sought an assessment of their former lawyer's accounts, the release of their file, and a stay of enforcement of an $80,000 mortgage given to the lawyer's spouse for legal fees.

The court found no special circumstances to justify assessing 14 accounts rendered prior to November 2012, except for a limited review of an alleged double-billing error.

The court ordered the lawyer to release the file, finding the solicitor's lien was lost because the lawyer had terminated the retainer.

Enforcement of the mortgage was stayed pending the outcome of the assessments.