Sarah Strathopolous

This costs endorsement addresses two motions brought by the Respondent, both dismissed with costs awarded to the Applicant.

The first motion challenged the court's jurisdiction over property claims, and the second sought leave to appeal an arbitrator’s email communication.

The court reviews the guiding legal principles for costs in family law, including reasonableness, proportionality, and bad faith.

The Applicant was awarded $48,500 for the jurisdiction motion and $16,500 for the leave motion, both payable within 30 days.

The moving party brought a motion to quash an appeal filed in the Court of Appeal, arguing the court lacked jurisdiction.

The responding party acknowledged the error and requested a transfer to the Divisional Court under section 110(1) of the Courts of Justice Act.

The Court of Appeal granted the motion to quash and declined to order a transfer, finding the proposed appeal lacked obvious merit and that further delay would prejudice the moving party given significant unpaid support and costs arrears.

The Appellant sought leave to appeal an arbitrator's email explanation regarding the costs of translating French documents to English, alleging an error of law and bias.

The Respondent opposed, arguing the motion was out of time, the right to appeal was misstated, the Appellant had consented to translations, there was no error of law, and no bias.

The court dismissed the motion for leave, finding no right of appeal for an explanation note, no error of law by the arbitrator on a question not put to him, and that the arbitration agreement limited appeals to questions of law, which this was not.

The court also found no evidence of bias.

The Applicant sought summary judgment to enforce child support provisions of a separation agreement, while the Respondent sought to stay the summary judgment and remit the matter to arbitration, and to appoint a specific arbitrator.

The court confirmed its jurisdiction to hear the matter, dismissed the Respondent's motion to adjourn the summary judgment, and granted the Respondent's request to stay the summary judgment application, remitting the matter to arbitration.

The court dismissed the Respondent's motion to appoint an uncertified arbitrator (William C. McDowell) and instead granted the Applicant's alternate request to appoint a certified family law arbitrator (Cheryl Goldhart), emphasizing the legal requirement for arbitrators to be properly credentialed for awards to be enforceable.

The Respondent brought a motion to strike the Applicant's Motion to Change (MTC) due to the Applicant's long-standing non-compliance with multiple court orders, including significant arrears in child and spousal support ($90,868.06) and an unpaid costs award ($159,533.73) from a previous trial.

The Applicant, who had declared bankruptcy but was undischarged, also failed to provide adequate disclosure regarding his employment changes.

The court applied the three-step test for striking pleadings and found the Applicant's conduct to be egregious and exceptional, demonstrating a blatant disregard for court orders and a "scorched earth" litigation approach.

The court granted the Respondent's motion, striking the Applicant's MTC in its entirety and imposing strict conditions for any future motions, emphasizing the need for the Applicant to demonstrate genuine compliance with existing orders and good faith.

The respondent sought full indemnity costs of $39,434.18 following a successful motion where the applicant's conduct was found to demonstrate bad faith.

The self-represented applicant opposed the quantum, asserting impecuniosity and over-lawyering by the respondent's counsel.

The court rejected the applicant's arguments, finding no evidence of impecuniosity and concluding that the time spent by the respondent's counsel was proportional to the complexity of the issues.

The applicant was ordered to pay the full amount claimed.

The Applicant, Jennifer Dixon, surreptitiously accessed and stored thousands of the Respondent, Peter Lindsay's, private and privileged emails after their separation.

The Respondent brought a motion seeking a declaration that the emails were improperly obtained and an order preventing their use.

The court found that Dixon deliberately accessed the emails without consent, rejecting her claims of consensual access and inadvertent storage.

The court declared the emails "stolen" and prohibited Dixon from using or referring to them in any legal proceeding.

Dixon was ordered to provide full particulars of her access, return and destroy all copies, and instruct any third parties to do the same.

The court also ordered Dixon to pay full indemnity costs to the Respondent due to her bad faith conduct.

This is a costs decision on appeal from a family law matter.

The appellant (father) sought to stay family law claims pending resolution of a constitutional challenge under s. 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982.

The motion judge struck the amended answer as lacking proper pleading of the constitutional claim.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal allowed the appeal in part, granting leave to amend the answer but refusing to stay the interim support order or the family law claims.

The respondent (mother) was found to be more successful on the appeal.

The court awarded costs to the respondent in the amount of $20,000, inclusive of the costs of a stay motion and all disbursements and HST.

The respondent in matrimonial litigation moved to have the former case management judge recuse himself due to a reasonable apprehension of bias.

The new case management judge dismissed the motion, finding it premature and pointless as the former judge was not scheduled for future involvement.

The court determined the respondent had an ulterior motive to revisit prior rulings and that the motion constituted an abuse of process, contrary to the Family Law Rules' objectives of saving time and expense.

The appellant appealed a costs award of over $300,000 made by the motion judge in family law proceedings.

The motion judge had awarded costs to the respondent following a successful motion to strike the appellant's answer on the basis that a constitutional issue was not properly pleaded.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal on the merits, which provided the appellant with the opportunity to amend his answer.

The respondent remained entitled to costs of the original motion, but the costs award was reduced from over $300,000 to $200,000.

The court found that the motion judge erred in principle by adopting a "close to full recovery" approach, giving undue weight to settlement offers in circumstances where settlement was not practically possible, inappropriately increasing costs based on the appellant's ability to pay and the respondent's financial need, and failing to apply the proportionality principle required by the Family Law Rules.

Two members of the Haudenosaunee (Six Nations of the Grand River) brought a family law dispute regarding custody, child support, and spousal support.

The respondent raised a constitutional claim under s. 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982, asserting an Aboriginal right to have the dispute resolved through Haudenosaunee governance processes and laws rather than Ontario family law.

The motion judge struck the constitutional claim without leave to amend and dismissed it as lacking standing and justiciability.

The appellant appealed.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal in part, setting aside the dismissal of the constitutional claim and permitting the appellant to seek leave to amend his pleading.

The court held that while the constitutional claim faced serious obstacles, it was premature to dismiss it summarily at an early stage of proceedings.

The court also refused to stay the family law proceedings and permitted interim support orders to continue pending resolution of the constitutional claim.

The applicant sought costs following her success on two motions regarding jurisdiction and the respondent's constitutional challenge based on aboriginal rights.

The applicant claimed $500,000 on a full recovery basis, including a risk premium.

The court rejected the inclusion of a risk premium in family law cases and found the respondent's conduct unreasonable but not amounting to bad faith.

The court fixed costs at $315,415 and ordered that the costs be designated as a support order enforceable by the Family Responsibility Office, as the underlying motions were necessary to clear the path for the applicant's support claims.

Appeal from a trial judge's decision granting sole custody of a child to the respondent mother and permitting relocation from Toronto to Nova Scotia.

The appellant father challenged the custody award, relocation decision, access schedule, and costs award.

The Court of Appeal upheld the trial judge's decisions on custody and relocation, finding they were supported by the record and within the trial judge's discretion.

The court modified the access schedule by removing a four-hour restriction on overnight visits with the child's grandparents, finding it inconsistent with the trial judge's own findings regarding the child's relationship with the paternal grandparents.

The costs award was upheld as within the trial judge's discretion.

The applicant brought a family law application seeking custody, child support, and spousal support.

The respondent, a Haudenosaunee person and member of the Six Nations, filed an Amended Answer challenging the court's jurisdiction and the applicability of Ontario family law legislation, asserting an aboriginal right under s. 35(1) of the Constitution Act, 1982 to have the dispute resolved under Haudenosaunee laws and processes.

The applicant moved to strike the Amended Answer and dismiss the constitutional case summarily.

The court held that while conflict of laws principles apply to the jurisdiction analysis, they must be modified to account for aboriginal rights claims.

However, the court struck the Amended Answer in its entirety, finding that it failed to plead the necessary material facts, that the respondent lacked standing to advance a collective right of self-government individually, and that the broad claim of immunity from Ontario family law was not cognizable under s. 35(1) jurisprudence.

The court declared it had jurisdiction to hear the family law issues and dismissed the respondent's motion for a stay of proceedings.

The court issued supplementary reasons after dismissing an application for leave to appeal a costs order.

The moving party estate filed a reply factum after the initial decision was released, pursuant to an extension agreement between counsel that was not brought to the court's attention.

The court reviewed the reply factum but found it did not address new issues raised in the responding factum, but rather repeated previous arguments regarding the Indian Act and on-reserve assets.

The denial of leave to appeal was confirmed.

The moving party estate sought leave to appeal a motion judge's order dismissing its request to use off-reserve property to satisfy a $40,000 costs award in favour of the responding party wife.

The underlying family law dispute involved claims for spousal support and equalization against the deceased husband's estate, which included both on-reserve and off-reserve property.

The court denied leave to appeal, finding no conflicting decisions and no reason to doubt the correctness of the motion judge's decision that enforcement issues should follow, rather than precede, a determination of entitlement on the merits.

In a divorce proceeding, the applicant amended her application to claim an unequal division of net family property under s. 5(6) of the Family Law Act, alleging the respondent recklessly depleted his assets by spending money on a mistress, escorts, and adult websites.

The respondent brought a motion to strike these amendments.

The court found that the amendments failed to disclose a reasonable claim because the applicant did not plead material facts showing a significant reduction in the respondent's net family property or that equalization would be unconscionable.

The motion to strike was granted without leave to amend, as it was clear the applicant could not specify the financial impact of the alleged spending.

The applicant mother brought a motion to amend her application to add a civil conspiracy claim against the respondent father and his new wife, alleging they structured their financial affairs to hide the father's income and assets to avoid child support obligations.

She also sought to add the new wife and her corporations as parties, obtain financial disclosure from them, and obtain an order for interim child support and arrears.

The father claimed his only income was a $14,000 disability pension, but the mother provided evidence of a lavish lifestyle and his active involvement in the new wife's businesses.

The court allowed the amendments and the addition of the parties, finding the threshold for amending pleadings was met and the limitation period issue regarding the conspiracy claim was a triable issue of discoverability.

The court ordered full disclosure and ordered the father to pay $1,500 per month in interim child support, fixing arrears at $94,300 and section 7 arrears at $44,000, based on the unvaried 2005 Minutes of Settlement.

The respondent husband brought a motion to reduce an interim spousal support order of $16,848 per month to $7,000 per month, arguing a substantial change in circumstances due to business losses and capital erosion.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the original interim order explicitly anticipated the husband would need to encroach on capital to maintain the marital standard of living due to his failure to provide adequate financial disclosure.

The court held that the heavy onus to vary a temporary order was not met and that final financial determinations should be left to the impending trial.