ONTARIO
SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE
B E T W E E N:
ANGELA DE CRUZ-LEE
On her own behalf
Applicant
- and -
LARRY LEE
Ms. Murthi, for the Respondent
Respondent
HEARD: November 18, 20, 2014, December 4, 5, 2014 and February 9-13, 2015
REASONS FOR JUDGMENT
Justice Skarica
INDEX
SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE. i Overview. 1 Issues. 2 The Undisputed Facts. 3 Disputed Facts. 4 The Trial Evidence. 5 Analysis of Witness’ Evidence. 125 Pradeep Bhatia. 125 Angela de Cruz-Lee. 129 Michelle Lee. 185 Larry Lee. 190 Overall Conclusion as to Facts. 197 The Law. 203 Order 220
Overview
1This case is a classic illustration of the difficulty of obtaining justice when a trial is conducted by a party or parties who are self-represented. Ms. Angela De Cruz-Lee (“Ms. De Cruz-Lee”) was self-represented and conducted the trial by herself. It is said that a person who represents himself has a fool for a client. That saying should add something about how self-representation is about the most expensive trial lawyer you can pay for. On June 20, 2014 this trial originally was scheduled for one to four days and was set for November 17, 2014 to settle two issues. On November 17, 2014 a further pre-trial was held. The issues were down to ownership of the home estimated to be a one to two day trial. The trial in fact went on for nine days. The dispute was over an approximate $53,000 held in trust. Regrettably, the costs of this trial will consume most if not all of that amount. I note that Superior Court trials in Family Court are governed by a variety of rules. These rules are designed to ensure trials are expeditiously run at some cost efficient level. At this trial, those rules meant nothing. Virtually all of Ms. De Cruz-Lee’s exhibits were produced for the first time at trial without prior notice on the respondent. They were allowed to be filed in any event due to the fact that Ms. De Cruz-Lee was unrepresented. Ms. De Cruz-Lee struggled with legal procedures and rules of evidence, which were observed more in breach than in rigour. When I produced law for Ms. De Cruz-Lee to make submissions on, she instead engaged in character assassination on the respondent, based on allegations not found in any of the evidence.
2Ultimately her submission to me was to order DNA analysis on virtually all of the lawyers (including her own former lawyer) involved in the case because they were protecting Mr. Lee. And to charge the daughter she loves with perjury. And to ignore the law I provided her because she was human trafficked. I must admit that these were most novel submissions.
3In writing this judgment, I have cautioned myself, that in the end, Ms. De Cruz-Lee was poorly represented and I am going to have to make allowance for that fact in making my decision.
Issues
4At the trial management/settlement conference held on June 20, 2014, the trial was set for trial on November 17, 2014 for one to four days on two issues:
(1) Child support, and
(2) Equalization.
Issue #1 – Child Support
5The parties have a daughter – Michelle De Cruz-Lee, born on September 11, 1994 (“child”). As will be discussed later, the applicant Angela De Cruz-Lee (“mother”) denies that Mr. Lee (“father”) is the biological father of the child. It is undisputed however that the father has always acted as the de facto father of the child. Further the child since 2010 has resided with her father and not with the mother. In the mother’s sworn financial statement she indicates she has been unemployed since July 5, 2007. She supports herself by receiving social assistance of $1,086.00 per month.
6Counsel for the respondent father, quite reasonably, concedes that the mother is not in a financial position to pay child support. Further, the child at the present time is not going to school but is employed. It is anticipated that she will go to university at some future time. There was no serious dispute that the mother cannot pay any type of child support given her financial circumstances. There will be no order for child support for Michelle Lee.
Issue #2 – Equalization
The Undisputed Facts
7There are not many. It is undisputed that the home in question – 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton was purchased on December 11, 1996.
8On April 26, 2013, Justice Price ordered that the home be sold. (Ms. De Cruz-Lee says that her lawyer, Mark Trenholme, who was present for the motion, never told her about it and she was unaware on April 26, 2013, that it was proceeding). On May 2, 2013, Justice van Rensburg ordered that the house could be sold without the signature or consent of the wife Angela De Cruz-Lee.
9Tab A of the respondent’s document brief, Exhibit 54, indicates that the closing date of the house sale was May 6, 2013 and $372,237.88 was received from the purchaser on closing. After payments made for mortgages and other fees, $52,992.61 is being held in trust subject to any deduction of legal fees for work.
10It is this approximate $53,000.00 that is in dispute and is subject to equalization.
11The other significant undisputed facts can be listed as follows:
(1) The parties met in Malaysia in 1982. She was 17 and he was 41.
(2) They moved to Canada in September, 1982.
(3) They were married on May 27, 1985.
(4) The daughter, Michelle De Cruz-Lee was born on September 11, 1994.
Disputed Facts
12The reader may notice that as I review the evidence the facts seem incongruous, unwieldy, inchoate and at times just plain difficult to follow. This is because it was. I want the reader of the judgment to understand just how difficult and unorganized the evidence (that was admissible) was when presented to this court as a direct result of the conduct of Ms. De Cruz-Lee. In the subsequent sections titled: Analysis of Witness Evidence and Overall Conclusions as to Facts, I attempt to provide clarity based on my findings of fact.
13Material disputed facts in this trial include the date of separation, ownership of 56 Ravenscliffe, and who the abuser was in what was an obvious long standing toxic relationship.
14As this trial commenced in November, 2014 and completed in February, 2015, I ordered the trial transcripts so that I could ensure all material evidence would be considered. I propose to review the evidence in the transcripts and then conduct an analysis regarding the credibility of the parties, their main witnesses and then make the appropriate findings of fact.
The Trial Evidence
Preliminary Submissions by Ms. De Cruz-Lee
15Ms. De Cruz-Lee indicated she has been sick for the last couple of months.
16She has had multiple chemical sensitivity her whole life and receives ODSP for it. I was advised that people have been smoking outside the court house for the last five years and that yesterday, November 17, 2014, Ms. De Cruz-Lee complained to the Ministry of Health about it. Ms. De Cruz-Lee advised she had a high fever due to an infection. She appeared to be functioning fine and agreed to carry on. She was told to advise me if she could not proceed due to ill health.
17Ms. De Cruz-Lee advised that she tried to get legal counsel but “so far every one of them has denied me the ability to have legal counsel because my previous legal counsel motioned on my behalf without my consent April 26th and he also perjured on affidavits to enable the respondent to sell the house. No lawyer is willing to go after that person let alone to help me in my case and as you can see, I’ve got a whole bunch of evidence here because there has been a fraud perpetrated on the home since 2001.”
18After discussing courtroom procedure, Ms. De Cruz-Lee indicated, “Your Honour, the only thing I find about this whole case is my rights have been violated because…I have no access to legal counsel. I’ve been denied legal counsel because of the previous counsel’s fraud.”
Douglas Wilker
19This was the first witness called by Ms. De Cruz-Lee. The bulk of his testimony consists of leading questions asked by Ms. De Cruz-Lee which would require answers involving hearsay evidence. He is an auto mechanic. Ms. De Cruz-Lee was dating his stepson in 2010. Ms. De Cruz-Lee was “thrown” out of her house in 2010, according to what he was told by Ms. De Cruz-Lee and his stepson. In October 2010, Ms. De Cruz-Lee moved into Mr. Wilker’s house at 616 Dogwood Lane, Waterloo. She has lived there continuously from October, 2010 until the present time. Mr. Wilker drove her to court approximately 10 times but on April 26, 2013 (the date of a motion attended by Ms. De Cruz-Lee’s lawyer, Mark Trenholme), Mr. Wilker drove her “nowhere”. He was not aware of a court case on April 26, 2013. The respondent told him there was a restraining order. Mr. Wilker drove Ms. De Cruz-Lee to both the courthouse and a police station and received hearsay information that there was no restraining order.
20In cross-examination, Mr. Wilker confirmed that Ms. De Cruz-Lee lives at his residence and when asked if she pays rent, Mr. Wilker stated, “Occasionally, not all the time”. She has to pay $200 rent per month. Mr. Wilker could not remember all the dates he drove Ms. De Cruz-Lee to court. He remembered driving her to court on May 2, 2014.
21In re-examination, Mr. Wilker indicated that paying rent occasionally meant, “Whenever she can afford it that she doesn’t have other bills”.
22In a pattern that was repeated many times in the trial, whenever Ms. De Cruz-Lee got an answer she did not like, she would, de facto, testify, under the guise of asking questions.
23Here the following series of questions and answers ensued:
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Okay. Q. Have I always paid you consistently rent before, before the, before the start of this year?
A. No, you haven’t.
Q. Okay, I haven’t consistently paid you but I paid you when I, when I got the money?
A. Correct.
THE COURT: Well, no now you’re testifying.
MS. MURTHI: Objection.
THE COURT: You got a bad answer that doesn’t mean, that doesn’t entitle you to correct him.
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Q. Whenever money is owed do I always pay you back?
A. Yes, you do.
Q. So you would say that if I pay you...
THE COURT: No, no, no, that’s – now you’re putting words in his mouth. “You would say this...” No, and that’s going to say yes or no.
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Your Honour my mind a lot of times is occupied with court dates so when I miss a date or something like that, I will tell Mr. Wilker, I’ll owe him and then I’ll pay.
Q. So basically I’ve always paid everything I owed you, correct?
A. Correct.
MS. MURTHI: Objection.
Q. Do I owe you any outstanding payments?
A. Yes, you do.
Q. Okay. And I’m trying to explain that, that Your Honour...
THE COURT: Yes, I know but you’re asking questions and getting bad answers and then you got...
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Because it sounds bad because what it is, is Your Honour half the time I’m thinking about this court case and...
THE COURT: And what relevance does it have anyway, whether you pay debts or don’t pay debts?
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Well, it does show that the fact that I’ve been busy trying to get this – oh, okay, hang on.
THE COURT: Well how does it help you right now, you owe him money, how does that help?
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Q. Okay, do I owe you many money?
A. Yes, you do.
Pradeep Bhatia
24The next witness called by Ms. De Cruz-Lee was Pradeep Bhatia.
25He testified initially on November 18 and November 20, 2014.
26Mr. Bhatia indicated that he was neighbours with the Lee couple. In 2003, he was walking his dog and he met Angela. At p. 43 of the November 18, transcript, Mr. Bhatia testified, “she introduced to me as her husband and we started to get a friendship relationship as neighbours basically. That was 2003 and I really found the couple, Angela, Larry and their daughter to be wonderful, fantastic people.” He testified that they were a “wonderful couple”. He knew the daughter as “Baybe”. He met her when she was eight and “she was the most incredible daughter I’ve seen, you know, in quite a whole. Very educated, very well spoken … at such a young age, articulate, everything. Perfect, perfect daughter.” The relationship between the parents and daughter seemed perfect.
27The couple did not ask for help from 2003 to 2007. Then on July 5, 2007, he was in Edmonton and received an urgent call from Angela. He told her that when he got back, they could stay at his home. On July 12, 2007, Angela, Larry, Baybe and the two dogs moved into his basement as they had been locked out of their house.
28Two days later, the daughter was not comfortable and the family was shifted to a nearby Howard Johnson in Brampton, at Queen and Kennedy. They were there for several months. He was advised that they had been locked out due to some fraud beyond their control. Mr. Bhatia’s father was knowledgeable about legal matters and Mr. Bhatia and his father contacted a lawyer Paul Mand to look into the matter. The senior Mr. Bhatia retained Mr. Mand and paid a $5,000 retainer. Angela De Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee signed a promissory note to pay the $5,000 back but never repaid any of the $5,000.
29The $5,000 retainer was for Mr. Paul Mand to put in a motion to vacate the allegedly fraudulent mortgage put on by CIBC. This was done in 2007. To Mr. Bhatia’s knowledge, this motion was never actually heard.
30Maurizio Vani is a real estate lawyer who worked with Mr. Mand. In the middle of December 2007, an urgent call was made by Larry to Pradeep Bhatia indicating that Larry got a phone call from Maurizio Vani that if $7,800 was not paid that day, they would not get their house back. Mr. Bhatia went to the bank immediately and made a draft cheque payable to Mr. Vani for $7,800 and change. The family owed the Bhatia’s $12,800 at this point.
31A meeting was arranged by Mr. Bhatia, between Larry, his family and Baybe and a private mortgage broker, a Kanwal Singh. Kanwal offered a mortgage for 7 per cent plus a $15,000 finder’s fee. Larry took Kanwal outside and there was a heated conversation between Kanwal and Larry threatening to beat up Kanwal. At a subsequent meeting with Mr. Mand, Mr. Mand indicated that he needed $305,000 to put into court in order to fight the alleged fraudulent CIBC mortgage. Eventually, however Mr. Bhatia’s father arranged a mortgage with TD Bank at prime minus .95 per cent for a 1.45 per cent mortgage rate. Tab C of the respondent’s document brief was shown to Mr. Bhatia who confirmed that on December 20, 2007, a $305,000 charge was put on the home with Prem Bhatia (Pradeep Bhatia’s father) and Larry Lee as mortgagors. The CIBC mortgage was then paid off. On December 20, 2007, as well, Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee were put on title as owners of the property. The father signed the mortgage reluctantly as that was not his original intent. The father did not want to go on title but his mortgage person at TD Bank told him you need to be on with one percent to get this mortgage, otherwise it is not possible.
32From 2007 onwards, Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia had a joint account because of the mortgage. Pradeep Bhatia observed there were lots of alcohol purchases being made on that account. Larry was responsible for the payments but towards the end of 2012, payments were not being made on time and the mortgage was going into default. Property taxes were not being paid. TD Bank started to call threatening power of sale proceedings. The Bhatias decided they had no choice but to sell the house to recover the money. If the power of sale went through, the bank would have total control and if the bank sold the house for less than the mortgage, they could be on the hook for the remaining amount. Mr. Trenholme, Angela De Cruz-Lee’s lawyer, brought a motion to sell the house on April 26, 2013. Pradeep Bhatia was in attendance at the motion. Tab 7 of the trial record confirms that this motion was brought before Justice Price in Brampton on April 26, 2013 by Mark Trenholme, solicitor for Angela De Cruz-Lee, who was present in court as was Larry Lee, in person and Prem Bhatia, in person. The house was sold at the end of April, 2013. Pradeep Bhatia believed Angela had okayed this because “this is her lawyer”.
33He had no knowledge that Angela was not okay with the house sale. Angela was very, very upset that the house had been taken from her. She was upset, crying as this house was her life because of her illness and she bought it to give her life a purpose.
34In addition to the $12,800 Mr. Bhatia loaned mainly Larry but also Angela additional monies so that $20,000 is owed by the Lees to Mr. Bhatia. This money has never been repaid. Pradeep Bhatia testified that all of the uncertainty regarding these dealings cost his father his life.
35The visiting of lawyers and attending court dates caused Mr. Bhatia senior a lot of stress. On the night of the court date – April 26, 2013 – Mr. Bhatia had a stroke and ultimately died 10 days later. Mr. Bhatia did bring a motion to be added as a party to these proceedings to get his $20,000 back but his motion was opposed by both Angela and Larry Lee. The motion was dismissed on November 19, 2013 as Mr. Bhatia had no status to bring it as he was not the administrator of his father’s estate (see Tab 10 of the Trial Record). Mr. Bhatia was ordered to pay costs of $500 to each of Angela and Larry Lee.
36Larry Lee told Mr. Bhatia that he purchased the house in 1996. Mr. Lee told Mr. Bhatia that Angela had no money and had never worked a day in her life. Subsequently, when Mr. Bhatia reviewed the title documents in Tab C of the respondent’s brief, he was shocked to learn that Angela bought the house in 1996. Accordingly, he came to the conclusion that he had been lied to repeatedly by Larry that he purchased the house. Tab C of the respondent’s document brief shows that the house was transferred from Angela De Cruz-Lee to Larry Lee and Angela De Cruz-Lee in 2001. Ms. De Cruz-Lee filed as Exhibit 2 an affidavit of Mr. Lee which includes an exhibit that indicates that the 2001 transfer from Angela De Cruz-Lee to Angela De Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee, was done as a gift.
37On November 20, 2014, Mr. Bhatia was cross-examined. Ms. De Cruz-Lee objected to the presence in court of a Mr. Rob Christie, a friend of hers from 1993 to 1994 whom she attended York University and was involved in some of the documents. Neither party intended to call him as a witness.
38Mr. Bhatia confirmed that the Lees seemed very happy in 2003 but there were no outward displays of affection. In 2007, they still seemed like a couple. He did not realize they were separated until these proceedings started. Mr. Bhatia recognized the signatures of Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee in Tab F of the respondent’s document brief, dated April 22, 2013. The document indicates that Prem Bhatia is owed $20,000 and was to receive $20,000 from the sale proceeds. It further indicates that the family law lawyer for Ms. De Cruz-Lee was not willing to release the $20,000 to Prem Bhatia and there is a direction to Mr. Arora to hold back the sale proceeds in order for Prem Bhatia to make a claim or seek a settlement agreement. On page 14 of the November 20, 2014 transcript, Mr. Bhatia confirms that Ms. De Cruz-Lee has never held a steady job but she has worked occasionally, like one day here and there. Mr. Lee was earning income when they were together and Ms. De Cruz-Lee had a disability pension.
39In re-examination, Ms. De Cruz-Lee asked about working occasionally, one day here and there. Ms. Murthi objected, saying that it was not asked in cross-examination. I did not note it. The court reporter at p. 20 had no notes of it either. Ms. De Cruz-Lee was told not to proceed further on this part of her questions. Frankly, the court reporter, Ms. Murthi and myself were mistaken. Mr. Bhatia did testify in cross-examination that she worked occasionally, a day here or there. However, Ms. De Cruz-Lee was not prejudiced by my ruling as this issue was re-visited at pages 36 and 48 to 49 of the November 20, 2014 transcript. Mr. Bhatia indicated that he knew Ms. De Cruz-Lee was working on mining deals and had an outside promotional business but was not working as such at a job.
40Regarding the 2007 refinancing, Ms. De Cruz-Lee was in the meetings with the lawyer and the mortgage broker. In his meetings with the TD Bank, Ms. De Cruz-Lee was not present.
41He was aware that in 2003 that she and Larry were working on some mining deal involving calcium carbonate with a potential of making half a million dollars.
42Exhibits 4A, 4B and 5 were introduced which indicated that Verdun Bigelow is to pay off the mortgage at 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton; that Bigelow and Larry Lee were to buy a mine owned by Angela De Cruz-Lee for $500,000 and that Verdun Bigelow owes Angela De Cruz-Lee consulting income of $38,000 for six months.
43On November 24, 2003 Verdun Bigelow was put on title at 56 Ravenscliffe.
44On January 1, 2004 a charge in the name of Verdun Bigelow was deleted and was replaced by CIBC Mortgage Inc.
45Exhibit 5 was reviewed and indicates that Mr. Lee has experience as a mortgage broker.
46At page 58, I advised Ms. De Cruz-Lee to be cautious about filing extracts from Mr. Lee’s answer, as once she files something as part of her case, it’s both evidence for and against her. At page 61, Ms. De Cruz-Lee advised that she wished to call two additional witnesses, “just Helmut Gumz and Simone Sanube”. No disclosure had been given to the respondent regarding these two witnesses. Since she was unrepresented, I allowed her to call these two witnesses with an option for the respondent to request a short adjournment if the respondent required it.
Helmut Gumz
47He was with Angela de Cruz-Lee at her meetings at the court house. Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted her house back.
48In April 2013, he was with Angela and Douglas Wilker and they attended at 56 Ravenscliffe Court. Larry Lee and Michelle Lee were there. Larry was there and he was hostile. Larry said there was a restraining order for Angela. Michelle Lee was hostile as well. They went to the police station and the police could not produce a restraining order. On November 17, 2014, they went to the court house, and no restraining order was shown to the witness.
49In cross-examination, Mr. Gumz indicated he was Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s boyfriend.
50In re-examination, Mr. Lee’s girlfriend also showed hostility when they went to the house. Mr. Gumz indicated his relationship with Ms. de Cruz-Lee was a good relationship and that she is truthful and hard working.
Saysanone Sanoubana
51She is a retired registered nurse manager. She works in the long-term care industry. She is active in politics. She has been friends with Ms. de Cruz-Lee for five years. She has a strong bond with Ms. de Cruz-Lee because KIMC law firm and CIBC bank and those kind of people also caused a family problem involving fraud and foreclosure. She has seen Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s documents and believes in her.
52She has spoken to Larry and heard his side of the story but to be honest, she finds Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s story very compelling. I found that this was opinion evidence that was not relevant or reasonable. She is worried about Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Baybe’s safety based on what Ms. de Cruz-Lee has told her and from observing Facebook posts showing Baybe holding alcoholic drinks in 2010 when she was fourteen. She has a high regard for Ms. de Cruz-Lee, from the bottom of her heart. She was asked if Angela de Cruz-Lee were to run for prime minister, “would you vote for me?” The answer was what I would consider to be a politician’s answer as it was neither yes or no but was as follows:
Q. So if I were to run for Prime Minister would you vote for me?
A. I, I will support you dear that’s the reason I’m here. You know I always offer you support in the past five years. I always do.
53Ms. Sanoubana concluded, “I feel you’re a victim and I want to support you”.
54Not surprisingly, Ms. Murthi chose not to cross-examine this witness. Ms. de Cruz-Lee, at page 91 of the November 20, 2014 transcript advised that she had one witness left and that it was her. Alas, this position changed after her evidence was completed. The matter was adjourned to December 4 and 5, 2014, in the hope to complete this originally scheduled one to two day matter.
Angela de Cruz-Lee – December 4, 2014
55Ms. de Cruz-Lee advised early on in her testimony that she had a lot of new information that, “I was not privy to because the two lawyers I had had kept everything from me and did motions and … conducted court without me knowing.”
56Ms. de Cruz-Lee introduced as Exhibit 6 an excerpt of the respondent’s answer which is found at Tab 16 of the respondent’s trial record. Exhibit 7 was entered which was an outline of Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s evidence and documents she proposed to rely upon.
57Regarding Exhibit 6, Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that paragraph 12 applied to the situation here. Paragraph 12 states, “The respondent has not been intimate with the applicant around the time their daughter was conceived and believes that this is the date of separation.” The daughter was born on September 11, 1994. The date of conception would be December 11, 1993. She agrees that the respondent has not been intimate with her since 1989 when five police officers pulled him away from her because Mr. Lee was killing her at J.G. Marks at Woodbine Centre on her birthday on August 19, 1989. She says that is the time of separation “because that’s the time he was caught actually physically in front of the public”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that Mr. Lee has been impotent since that time onwards. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says he was charged and pleaded guilty and the judge ordered him to pay $500 to Sally Ann. He was later allowed to apply for a pardon. She states that he has not been intimate with her at the time the daughter was conceived.
58In paragraph 11, Mr. Lee indicates he supported her in university. She denies this, indicating she applied for her own OSAP and did not focus on exploiting men because she was busy studying and working. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she has environmental allergies, described as multiple chemical sensitivity. She receives ODSP because of that plus traumatic stress disorder and indicated she would later file a medical report. She denies sexual exploiting men. “If I wanted to do all that, I’d be driving a Mercedes Benz, I’m sure”.
59She homeschooled her daughter because she was suffering from the same “elements that I did, I suffer”. She denies having 15 different relationships with other men. The previous exhibits filed proves that she is owed $500,000 plus $38,000 times two. Instead of paying her, they took her house.
60The child was conceived in December 1993. She agrees that their separation took place before the purchase of the house. Ms. de Cruz-Lee filed as Exhibit 9 the Transfer/Deed of Land indicating that 56 Ravenscliffe was purchased by Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee on December 11, 1996, for $210,470.90. She purchased the house using her own funds from her illness. There is no Mr. Lee there and there was never to be a Mr. Lee there. The purchase date, December 11, 1996, is exactly three years after the date of separation alleged by Mr. Lee on December 11, 1993. A lawyer friend, Matthew Stone, attended the house and saw it before it was carpeted. She testified that Exhibit 5, which indicates a business card from Larry Lee with an address of 1462 Rose Bloom Road, establishes he had another address. She did not know whether the Rose Bloom address was a home address. She also indicated Mr. Lee was attached to 490 Latour Crescent and produced a document which I ruled was a hearsay document. It was excluded and marked as Exhibit A. This was the first of many lettered exhibits which I ruled as inadmissible due to hearsay, solicitor client privilege and other concerns.
61Ms. de Cruz-Lee attended York University from September 1992 until June 1995, when she graduated. Her evidence was that she was shocked that she was pregnant (conception date December 11, 1993) as she had no sexual relationship with any male persons from September 1992 until the child was born on September 11, 1994. She is out of luck as to who the father is as she knows for a fact and “I swear on the Bible doubly, I did not do anything to get myself pregnant. I would not do that to jeopardize my studies. I even ran for president of York University and had to give up a lot because I did not know how I got pregnant. I was in shock”.
62Based on that, Ms. de Cruz-Lee submitted as Exhibit 10 a prescription in the name of Larry Lee, dated August 1, 2001 for the drug Lorazepam for anxiety. Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated that Lorazepam is a date rape drug.
63Ms. de Cruz-Lee believes she was drugged and believes Mr. Lee has used that drug to do whatever he could with his friends or anybody and that is why he is so sure of saying that she has male relationships with other people. She confirmed that Mr. Lee drugged her and then allowed other people to rape her. I asked her if she had anything else to substantiate this allegation other than Exhibit 10. Ms. de Cruz-Lee then attempted to submit some documents which were excluded as hearsay. She tendered Exhibit 11, an email dated June 17, 2011 from Larry Lee to Mick Crossley, wherein Larry Lee stated, “Hi Mike… It’s Larry. Helen said you were in. Got a question. Larry” This was tendered to show how Mr. Lee communicates with them and “the Mick person has been calling me and harassing me on the phone, trying to make – take me out, calling me at twelve o’clock asking me to go out and I don’t even know him … Helen is another lady that’s very hostile, that’s a neighbour that has a relationship, sexual relationship of some sort”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee alleges that they have been stalking and harassing her. Helen is the lady who screamed at her when she went to the house with Mr. Douglas Wilker and Mr. Helmut Gumz.
64The company that did mining investments is 4047206 Canada Incorporated. She started the company and was doing sales, marking and doing the contracts. She did not see Mr. Lee as a partner. She asked him to help her with the legal and accounting. She attained a large contract in 2003 and Mr. Lee wanted in on the contract. Mr. Lee formed a partnership with a Mr. Bigelow and it lasted from 2003 to 2007.
65Exhibit 12 is a transfer document dated December 5, 2001 transferring 56 Ravenscliffe Court from Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee to Larry Lee and Angela de Cruz-Lee as joint tenants. Page 3 lists the purpose of conveyance as being a gift. Kenneth James acted as the lawyer for both parties.
66Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates she did not gift the house away. She would never give her house away. She would not give a house she bought for multiple chemical sensitivity. Her explanation of Exhibit 12 is that, “there is that Lorazepam in 2001, the medication that he has and 2001, this gifting process was done without her knowledge”. This was a fraud perpetrated on her. She has filed a complaint. She only knew about it when Kenneth James was incarcerated by the RCMP in 2012. She did not know about it until October 2012 when her lawyer Mark Trenholme told her about it. Up until October 2012, she thought the home was still in her name only.
67Regarding the 2013 motions that resulted in the house being sold, she was never made aware of any of the court motions that were done in 2013. The motions went ahead without her knowing and she was not aware of the motions being done in her name in April or May 2013. She was never served in 2012.
68The first point in time that she realized her house was sold was when Mark Trenholme told her she had no say in this whole matter on May 3, 2013.
69Kenneth James (regarding Exhibit 12 – the 2001 transfer) did not act for her. She has never met him.
70Regarding Exhibit 4(b), Verdun Bigelow went on her home as trustee. When she went to see the law firm that was supposed to see her get paid, they put him on title to her house as trustee. Bigelow was supposed to be trustee for the mining property and there was power of attorney between Mr. Lee and Bigelow so that they could have equivalent signing authority as partners. Bigelow went on title to her house using the erroneous paperwork that he signed. The agreement of purchase and sale – Exhibit 4B – is dated November 7, 2003.
71Exhibit 13 is a revocation of the living trust as outlined in Exhibit 4B. It is signed by Larry Lee and Angela de Cruz-Lee dated July 1, 2005. This documents purports to revoke Bigelow as trustee. The document alleges that Bigelow created fraud and put his name on “our” home to benefit Bigelow for personal gains. She did not really look at the word “our” as Bigelow was putting a mortgage on the home and terrorizing the Lees.
72Bigelow also owed her $38,000 income which she was promised.
73Ms. de Cruz-Lee again stated she tried to get a lawyer to represent her but none wanted to represent her since motions were done without her name and without her knowledge … “they don’t want to go against another lawyer who did motions without my knowledge and did things behind my back”.
74Exhibit 14 purports to be a power of attorney, signed by Angela de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee on January 5, 2006. It authorizes that the CIBC mortgage on 56 Ravenscliffe be transferred to Mr. Bigelow’s property at Cobalt “if the CIBC Bank, President’s Choice Bank or their legal representatives have found a legal way to put Verdun Bigelow and Verdun Nelson Bigelow together as one man”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says it was difficult to deal with this case because Mr. Bigelow and Larry were partners and his partner caused a fraud on the property.
75Exhibit 15 is an acknowledgement and direction which indicates that a mortgage of $238,250 was put on 56 Ravenscliffe signed by Verdun Bigelow by his attorney Larry Lee dated December 31, 2009. When CIBC went to court for non-payment of the mortgage, CIBC lied to Judge Robbie Gordon about serving Ms. de Cruz-Lee. This was all part of a fraud. The real culprit was a Robert Patterson. CIBC did not do their due diligence regarding the registration of power of attorney and trustee which was either not registered or registered illegally since 2004. CIBC then foreclosed and never served her.
76On January 6, 2006, title was transferred back to Larry and Angela by a lawyer, Mr. Prouse, and she argued with Mr. Prouse regarding putting Larry on title. This is why she used 2006 as the date of separation. Mr. Prouse said he will get rid of Bigelow first and next he will correct it.
77Exhibits 16 and 17 are letters from a title insurance company dated April 6, 2006, indicating that the interest in the land is vested in Larry Lee and Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee.
78Exhibit 17 refers to the CIBC mortgage and Ms. de Cruz-Lee was aware of it in April of 2006. She did not think it was right.
79Ulrich Kretschmar is another person that is in the mining business and he was put on title and taken off. He was put on title fraudulently and illegally. He was on to help – she was aware of that. She was living in a land mine with everyone stealing title. There was equity in the house they were stealing. She was under severe stress. She did not know who to trust, what to do.
80Exhibit 18 is a judgment, dated October 16, 2006 wherein the defendants Bigelow, Larry Lee and Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee are ordered to pay CIBC $236,040.40 plus costs plus interest plus an order for the defendants to deliver possession of the property.
81Ms. de Cruz-Lee estimated that the house was worth $400,000 plus and queried how CIBC could get a house for $230,000.
82On July 5, 2007, they kicked her out of the house. Paul Mand was retained by her neighbour.
83Exhibit 19 is a credit bureau report that shows Ms. de Cruz-Lee owing Verdun Bigelow $29,090 along with other debts. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates she did not owe Bigelow that money and it was done to sabotage her credit so that she was unable to save her home.
84Exhibit 21 is an email dated October 16, 2007 wherein Larry Lee attaches his pay stubs and bank statements to TD Bank. The bank wonders if Ms. de Cruz-Lee is to be put on title. Mr. Lee apologizes for the delay stating his wife and daughter are ill. Ms. de Cruz-Lee interprets this as she was being slowly staged out from title to the house.
85Exhibit 22 is a TD Canada Trust bank statement showing that a TD mortgage in the amount of $305,000 with a mortgage closing date of October 26, 2007.
86Ms. de Cruz-Lee was told by Mr. Mand that without funds, he could not win a motion. She was never led to believe that she signed her house away and somebody else owned it. She was aware that the Bhatias were helping out and that Mr. Mand needed $305,000 to put in the court’s hands for a short period of time. She was living at the Howard Johnson at the time.
87On December 21, 2007, Mr. Lee came and had the keys and said, do not worry there is a court case later. Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “I had no idea of what was going on. I was sick and my daughter was sick… I was very angry that Paul Mand was not doing anything fast.” Her understanding was that it was all in the court’s hands and it was going to be handled in 2008. She did not know there was a mortgage on the property. She knew there was $305,000 in court but she did not know where it came from (see page 135 of December 4, 2014 transcript).
88On May 23, 2010, she had surgery and Larry Lee refused to let her in the house. From December 2008 to 2010, Mr. Lee had total control over her. She was living in the house without talking to people, no television.
89Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that even though Mr. Lee said there was a restraining order, there was no restraining order. The respondent’s counsel agreed that there was no restraining order. When Ms. de Cruz-Lee went to the house on May 3, 2013, Mr. Lee yelled at her that there was no restraining order. In 2013, she had no idea the house was sold. She went to the house to tell Mr. Lee to fight the fraudulent CIBC mortgage.
90Her lawyer friend Matthew Stone, after she was locked out, spoke to Mr. Mand and blamed Ms. de Cruz-Lee for the fraud. She was mad at Mr. Stone and told him she was going to disbar him because he did a lot of bad things without her knowing.
91Exhibit 26 is excerpts of a motion and affidavit brought by Mr. Lee for custody of the daughter and exclusive possession of the home in November, 2010. The affidavit is commissioned by Matthew Stone as Duty Counsel. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says it is all lies. Mr. Lee indicates, in Exhibit 26, “Only myself is on title to this property”. At page 160 of the December 4 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates, “He’s not the only one on title. If anything, he is one per cent on title and illegally one per cent”. This is in reference to Mr. Lee’s comments that “only myself is on title”.
92Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates that on November 29, 2010, Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee were on title and on November 9, 2010, he was only one per cent owner. She indicates that she has the paperwork to show he is one per cent owner.
93Exhibit 20 was filed to show that Mr. Lee owes Rob Christie $20,000. This is the lawyer who Ms. de Cruz-Lee attempted to have excluded from the courtroom, earlier in the trial. Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not want Mr. Christie in court because he is part of the problem. She had told Rob Christie at some point about the fraud.
94An APL was put on the property on September 20, 2012 designating 56 Ravenscliffe as a matrimonial home. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she did not do it. Regarding the 99 per cent / 1 per cent split ownership, a lawyer, Harriet Altman and a lawyer’s letter says that 99 per cent was owned by Mr. Bhatia until July 2012. I indicated to Ms. de Cruz-Lee that if she was going to say that Mr. Lee only owned one per cent, I needed to see something that was admissible. She indicated she had a document showing the 1 per cent.
95Ms. de Cruz-Lee entered as Exhibit 30, an affidavit dated April 24, 2013 sworn by Jennifer Trenholme, who was an assistant of Mark Trenholme, who in turn was Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s lawyer. Paragraph 2 states, “The applicant Angela De Cruz-Lee caused a matrimonial home Designation to be registered on the property known as 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton, Ontario.”
96Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that the matrimonial designation was done without her knowledge. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she did not even know a motion, referred to in the affidavit, was going on. She testified, “Your Honour, I didn’t ask for this affidavit, I didn’t even know about the motion, I had no idea this was going on.” When I asked her that, she (Jennifer Trenholme) “just did it on her own without any…” Ms. de Cruz-Lee confirmed exactly, “Nobody, nobody served me, I didn’t know this was happening”.
97Ms. de Cruz-Lee was never served, never knew about the Exhibit 30 Jennifer Trenholme affidavit. It was done totally without her authorization.
98Exhibit 31 is a Notice of Motion, dated April 26, 2013 made by Angela de Cruz-Lee brought by her lawyer Mark Trenholme asking for an order regarding the sale of 56 Ravenscliffe. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that this motion was done completely without her authorization or knowledge. She did not know her house was up for sale. Mr. Trenholme was aware she asked him for paperwork to buy the house and save it from fraud. She was not aware of this April 26 motion. She did not do the matrimonial designation. It was done without her authorization or knowledge. She did not know about this until she complained to the Law Society. She would not sell her house; that house is very, very special to her. She agreed that Mark Trenholme put in his own motion, for whatever reasons he had. She did not know anything what Mr. Trenholme did until she got a letter from him dated October 3, 2012, which was entered as Exhibit 32. The letter refers to a matrimonial designation and to a July 2012 transaction which cleared a previous error on title with the result that Mr. Lee and Mr. Bhatia were tenants in common with Mr. Lee owning 99 per cent and Mr. Bhatia 1 per cent. Ms. de Cruz-Lee told the Law Society that they had to hold off because “every time I turn to help, some lawyer is trying to help the fraudsters and this is all to help so that I could never get back and fight for title to my house.” She did not designate the house as matrimonial.
99Ms. de Cruz-Lee has no evidence as to why Mr. Trenholme would on his motion put this designation on without her authorization. Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated it all goes back to the CIBC mortgage and that Mark Trenholme and Prouse, Dash & Crouch are friends. Mark Trenholme told Legal Aid she was tilting at windmills, he wrote that on January 4 with Justice Herold, saying she is a liar. She hired him because he said he was going to open up this can of worms and will win this for her. Mark Trenholme threw papers in her face.
100At Tab 7 of the respondent’s trial record, Justice Price on April 26, 2013, directed a lawyer Inderbir Arora to remove the matrimonial home designation in order to complete the sale of the home and to hold the net proceeds of 56 Ravenscliffe Court pending further court order or direction from the parties. If she had been present at that motion, Justice Price would have known this is a fraud, continuous fraud. The house was sold for $382,000 but this year it is selling for $600,000.
101In the paperwork it says she consented but she did not consent. Mr. Bhatia was very angry because “he” gave his father 99 per cent and Larry 1 per cent. She did not realize you could chop the house into pieces and give it to everybody.
102When she bought the house, she had multiple chemical sensitivity right from school, right from 1993 and had difficulty finishing her university degree from 1992 to 1995.
103Exhibit 33 was filed. It is an application for leave to place a motion on the motion list on short notice. The exhibit indicates that the sale of the home was to close on April 30, 2013 but could not because the applicant, Angela de Cruz-Lee, refused to sign the closing documents despite a consent order and the respondent, Larry Lee, is not liable for costs due to the inability to close. Tab 8 of the respondent’s trial record indicates that Justice van Rensburg (as she then was) heard the motion and ordered the sale of the home and removal of the matrimonial designation without the consent or signature of Angela de Cruz-Lee. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was ordered to pay $1,500 costs, to be taken from her share of the net proceeds of sale and was ordered to be responsible for all damages, costs and expenses due to her refusal to execute the documents on or before April 30, 2013.
104In 2007, all her belongings including her passport and ID were taken by Home Alone when they took the home away.
105Exhibit 34 was the next exhibit. It is an affidavit sworn by Mr. Trenholme on December 27, 2013 asking to be removed from the record. I noted that Mr. Trenholme criticizes Ms. de Cruz-Lee and pointed this out to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. She insisted on filing it as an exhibit despite my asking her numerous times whether she wished to it.
106In the Exhibit 34 affidavit, dated December 27, 2013 Mr. Trenholme makes the following points:
(1) Para. 3 – the Legal Aid certificate is exhausted and Legal Aid refuses to provide any time in support of Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s application
(2) Para. 5 – Ms. de Cruz-Lee was reminded that her Legal Aid Certificate was cancelled on November 1, 2013 by email. Ms. de Cruz-Lee responded that Legal Aid was in error and she was correcting the situation but did not provide further details
(3) Para. 17 – Ms. de Cruz-Lee appears intent on tilting at windmills based on fictions she has created and fomented over the years
(4) Para. 12 - Aside from problem with the retainer, Mr. Trenholme disagrees vehemently with Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s position in relation to certain issues she wishes to advance in this matter. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was sent an email on November 19, 2013. That email was a follow-up summary of extensive reporting letters previously sent.
(5) Para. 13 - Ms. de Cruz-Lee has ignored his advice and wishes to pursue a claim relating to her allegation of a mortgage and title fraud relating to the former matrimonial home. After obtaining as much documentation as possible from the lawyers involved, his conclusion is that Ms. de Cruz-Lee, her husband Larry Lee and several other parties engaged in activities that saw the title to the property change names or interests in ownership and fresh mortgages obtain for the purpose of obtaining mortgage funding because Ms. de Cruz-Lee could not qualify for a mortgage or there was a default on the mortgage. From his perspective, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s position is fanciful at best and totally without merit. The mortgage documents support the theory that each succeeding mortgage simply replaced the existing mortgage that, depending on the time frame, was ended or was in default. Each title change simply facilitated the borrowing of fresh mortgage funds to replace the mortgage in default.
(6) Para. 14 – Mr. Trenholme repeatedly told Ms. de Cruz-Lee there is no evidence of mortgage fraud and that from the information available to him, it appears she and her husband orchestrated the title transfers to obtain mortgage funds then returned title back to their own name.
107Ms. de Cruz-Lee gave the following explanation:
He’s criticizing me, he said that allegations of mortgage and title relating to the formal – he’s claiming he disagrees with it… if that’s the case, then how can he even put a motion in April 26, 2013 without my knowledge? He’s continuing the fraud…he says it’s sworn for no improper purpose…he’s saying that I disagree vehemently …I appear to be tilting windmills based on fiction, the Legal Aid certificate is exhausted. Your Honour the Legal Aid certificate is exhausted because he wrote a very bad letter to Legal Aid about me so I would not have any help and without help, I’m unable to show and prove.
108She indicated that in March 2013, Mr. Trenholme told her the house was protected. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “I kept asking all the lawyers to help me do this because I wanted to get away from this man. If that had happened, the house would never have been sold. They kept insisting that the house was matrimonial, I kept telling them it’s not. I kept telling them I was 17 years old when this man got a hold of me, he was 42”.
109She appealed the Legal Aid decision and it was denied. The reason why she is going forward is because “I’m one of the very many probably who has not had a chance to tell Your Honour what has happened, how they foreclosed without telling people and then I am one of those victims.”
December 5 Proceedings
110Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that she had copies of the percentage ownership (of the Bhatia – Lee purchase in 2007). I indicated that I had reviewed the transcripts and Pradeep Bhatia’s examination-in-chief indicated that he said at p. 104:
My father did not want to get on title as much as possible. He didn’t want to get involved, but ultimately his mortgage person, Anita, from TD Bank, told him you know, you need to be at one percent at least, just you know, get this mortgage, otherwise it’s not possible.
I indicated that was the only evidence I could find.
111Ms. de Cruz-Lee then filed a letter, dated September 18, 2012 from Mr. Trenholme to Maurizio Vani where Mr. Trenholme makes enquiries about a registration of transfer between Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia on July 17, 2012. There are a series of attachments to this letter. All of it was entered as Exhibit 37.
112Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that in 2007 they must have had Larry Lee at one per cent because when it is altered it becomes 99 per cent. Page 4 of Exhibit 37 does not contain this information at all. Page 4 is a transfer document entitled “In preparation on 2007 10 30”.
113It indicates that the transferees are Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia initially as “joint tenants” but “joint tenants” is scratched out and replaced with Larry Lee as tenant in common, 99 per cent and Prem Bhatia as tenant in common, 1 per cent. There are three initials beside this change.
114Ms. de Cruz-Lee says the alterations were not done by her and, “this paperwork, I did not consent to it.”
115The names of the transferors are Angela de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee to Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia. At page 11 of Exhibit 37 is a spousal consent purporting to be signed by Angela de Cruz-Lee dated November, 2007 in Toronto. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she was not in Toronto and “I don’t believe that’s my signature. They look like my signature but I don’t believe it is mine”. She does not recall signing that document and “that should have a date also”.
116Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates that Mark Trenholme knew about this in September 2012 and Mark Trenholme designated it as a matrimonial home in the October 5 letter. This designation was done by Mark Trenholme without her authority.
117Exhibit 39 was then filed. It is a transfer copy of the Exhibit 37 transfer at page 4 of Exhibit 37 without the initialed changes relating to percentages. It is dated December 20, 2007 and is registered as PR1393465 and appears as the document that was registered on title on December 230, 2007 at Tab C of the Document Brief.
118Exhibit 39 has the transferors as Angela de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee to Larry Lee and Bhatia as joints tenants. Regarding Exhibit 37, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates her driver’s licence used as identification was expired and she would not consent to a mortgage on the property. “I was fighting CIBC”.
119Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that on November 9, 2010, when Mr. Lee got exclusive possession from Justice Ricchetti, he was only one per cent owner and Larry Lee said he was the total owner of the house. Exhibit 39, indicating joint tenants as between Larry Lee and Bhatia was the document that was registered on December 20, 2007. The Exhibit 37 document outlining percentages was not registered.
120There is a note on Exhibit 37 (first page) from what appears to be Mr. Vani’s signature that the July 7, 2012 registration from Bhatia and Lee to Bhatia and Lee was to reflect the Exhibit 37 agreement that Larry Lee had 99 per cent and Bhatia had 1 per cent. This was explained to Ms. de Cruz-Lee by Mark Trenholme in the October 5, 2012 letter to her – Exhibit 32.
121Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates that the Exhibit 37 transfer was designed to dupe her by Maurizio Vani. “And Mark Trenholme, if he was a good lawyer, would have checked to see that paperwork was registered properly”.
122Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did not consent to these transfers. However, she agrees that on December 21, 2007, the day after the Exhibit 39 transfer was registered she moved back to the Ravenscliffe property. Exhibit 40 is an email dated December 18, 2007 wherein Maurizio Vani tells Larry Lee he cannot get title insurance and is uncomfortable with the transaction. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that Mark Trenholme knew about both the CIBC and TD mortgage frauds. She could not get her passport and identification back and she wrote to the Queen because she was frustrated. The Queen’s response was ruled hearsay and file as lettered Exhibit II.
123Exhibit 41 is a text message sent by Mr. Lee to Ms. de Cruz-Lee, dated September 28, 2010, stating, “Keep it up. You're not going to live long enough to get anything out of this divorce.” There were other threats made by Mr. Lee to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. They were filed as Exhibit 44.
124Ms. de Cruz-Lee complained to the office of the Independent Police Review Director about how the police handled her and how they favoured Mr. Lee when she attended the house at Ravenscliffe and received a response which was excluded as hearsay.
125Ms. de Cruz-Lee then returned to Exhibits 4A and 4B. There was a completed agreement between Ms. de Cruz-Lee and a Mr. Kretschmar. Exhibit 4C was entered at this time. It is a TD bank transfer. It indicates “TD transfer for mine – Vansickle Calcium Carbonate for 5000 cash 3000 2000 dollars CAD to Ulrich Kretschmar”.
126Exhibit 44 was then introduced which is a series of three text messages sent by Larry Lee to Angela de Cruz-Lee as follows:
(1) April 27, 2010 – “Well why don’t you go die. Then you don’t need anything.”
(2) August 4, 2010 – “Do you have your casket picked out.”
(3) September 28, 2010 – “Keep it up. You’re not going to live long enough to get anything out of this divorce.”
127In addition Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that Mr. Lee has threatened to deport her for 32 years. She is a permanent resident, but she does not have her permanent residence documents.
128Exhibit 48 was entered as the company profile for 4047206 Canada Inc. located at 56 Ravenscliffe Court in Brampton, with phone number (905) 796-9391. Angela de Cruz-Lee is named as the sole contact person. Larry Lee is listed as the Director.
129The attendance summary of Michelle de Cruz-Lee dated November 9, 2010, was filed as Exhibit 49. There are notes that Larry should be charged with child abuse and that he committed Federal Crime diverting Angela’s mail. The original marriage certificate, showing a marriage taking place on May 30, 1985 was filed as Exhibit 50.
130Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did indeed have 100,000 stocks worth $6,000,000. The name of the stock is HTRMF. No stock certificates were produced and Ms. de Cruz-Lee does not know what it is selling for, as she cannot find it. She filed Exhibit 51 which indicates the stock was HTRMF.PK. The last trade was 100 shares sold on November 11, 2008 for $31.00 which was both its 52 week high and low. Exhibit 51 is dated November 4, 2009. Accordingly, there appears to be no trades for approximately one year. Her stocks were in the safety deposit box prior to the disclosure. Mark Trenholme knows about it and he is lying.
131She was thinking all the time from day one that the fraud was caused by the CIBC lawyers and other lawyers. After the fraud and when they were kicked out and lived at Howard Johnson, Michelle went to regular school. When Ms. de Cruz-Lee homeschooled her there was no drugs, no alcohol and no partying.
132When Michelle went to high school, she was being bullied and subject to peer pressure. Mr. Lee also was sleeping with Michelle in the same bedroom and that’s the reason she was basically locked out of the house.
133After Ms. de Cruz-Lee got custody of Michelle she was partying, drinking alcohol in the home and got a tattoo. Exhibit 52 is a series of photos showing Michelle partying in 2010-2011 when she was 14, 15. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says that Michelle has multiple chemical sensitivity and the last thing she wants is Michelle showing her back on the internet.
Cross-Examination
134Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Mr. Lee were separated around 1989.
135She does not remember introducing Larry Lee as her husband to Mr. Bhatia in 2003. She always referred to him as Larry Lee.
136Mr. Lee stayed at 56 Ravenscliffe but he had another address.
137Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed the application on August 19 2010 that appears at Tab 14 in the trial record. Her lawyer was Temilola Farinloye. When Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed it, she had an argument with Ms. Farinloye regarding the house being referred to as a matrimonial home. She signed the document when she was under two surgeries.
138No amended application was ever filed. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked her to amend things and she never did it. She asked her to strike the respondent’s pleading and she never did it. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked her to amend things and she refused.
139The application says Ms. de Cruz-Lee was married on May 27, 1985 and that she separated in 2006.
140Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she told Richard Prouse in 2006, they were separated, “Why is he on my house title”. She signed the application with kids running around, screaming, television on and there was information she disagreed with. The application asks for exclusive possession of the matrimonial home. She was not a lawyer, did not understand all of this and followed her lawyer’s advice, as her lawyer was looking after her best interests.
141Exclusive possession of the matrimonial home was one of the claims in her application. She guesses her lawyer put it there; her lawyer filled it out.
142Ms. de Cruz-Lee did the application in 2010; she was locked out of the house. She was going out of surgery and going back to surgery. She relied on her lawyer to look after her best interests. She trusted lawyers for four years. She went to a family lawyer because that is what Legal Aid would cover.
143Exhibit 53 was put to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. It is a package of Notice of Assessments (NA) from 2006 to 2010 for Ms. de Cruz-Lee. It shows $1.00 earned for 2006. Ms. de Cruz-Lee said that Pradeep Bhatia and Mr. Lee did this. Mr. Lee did all the accounting and legal work. The 2006 NA indicates that her marital status is married. Ms. de Cruz-Lee has never done an income tax eturn and she did not submit a return. Someone else did her income tax. The 2007 Notice of Assessment (“NA”) also indicates $1.00 earned and her marital status as married. Ms. de Cruz-Lee believes Mr. Lee did the income tax. The 2008 NA indicates marital status as married and shows income of $6,718.00 from split pension income transferred to her. She does not know how to file income tax because Mr. Lee and Prem Bhatia have always done it. The 2009 NA shows zero income and marital status as separated. The 2010 NA shows income as $2,391.00 in social assistance payments. When it was suggested that the Exhibit 53 tax documents show she did not separate until 2009, her explanation was that the paperwork was done without her knowledge. A possible explanation would also be that Revenue Canada makes mistakes. Ms. de Cruz-Lee has been asking Revenue Canada to fix the mistakes as Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not do her taxes.
144Ms. de Cruz-Lee purchased the property in 1996. Her daughter was two at the time. She had just completed her university degree. She got a down payment that she (1) borrowed from friends and (2) car accident money.
145She did not borrow much because she saved a lot. She has not provided a cheque for the down payment. She has not brought in her friends to testify. One of them has died.
146Referring to Tab C of the respondent’s document brief, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that the house was transferred to her name in 1996. There was a mortgage with the Stars of Brampton who built the home. Around 2001 the home was transferred from her name to Mr. Lee and her together. There was a mortgage added by Home Trust and Punjab Loans and Financial Corp.
147In 1996 she had multiple chemical sensitivity that prevented her from working outside. She did home school and her business at the same time. Mr. Lee was earning a pension - it was $100 or $200 and was going towards alimony payments. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had a business that was paying. Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied that Mr. Lee was paying the mortgage, property taxes and bills to the house. The 2001 transfer from her to Mr. Lee and her was not done with her knowledge. When told that she would not qualify for a mortgage she answered that Mr. Lee handled the accounts. She is in contact with CRA because she is wondering “why I have only $1.00 when I have a Purchase and Sales Agreement where I have $38,000.” She denies that she needed to refinance her home in 2001 with a mortgage with Home Trust Company.
148She did not gift the home to Mr. Lee because they were separated even though between 1989 and 2010 she never made any applications for divorce. She did not do so because he sponsored her and he would deport her.
149Ms. de Cruz-Lee believed she could make money in business ventures.
150Regarding the mining business, the following questions and answers took place (see p. 127 of the December 5, 2014 transcript):
Q. You were particularly interested in getting involved with the mining business after you finished school.
A. Counsel, Rupa, I am the one that was the mining business.
151It was not mostly her venture; Mr. Lee wanted in on the accounting and legal part of the venture. She wanted to pay the bills. She was in charge of meeting the clients and interacting with them. Mr. Lee also met the individuals. Mr. Lee made partnerships with the people.
152Regarding Exhibit 4, it is an agreement of purchase and sale with the purchasers Verdun Bigelow and Larry Lee and the seller is Angela de Cruz-Lee for Dr. Ulrich Kretschmar. Her signature is there along with Verdun Bigelow and Larry Lee. Mr. Lee drafted the document. Ms. de Cruz-Lee denies that the ventures were unsuccessful and that she ended up losing money. Ms. de Cruz-Lee admits she got no money because Mr. Bigelow transferred money through Mr. Lee because they were partners. Ms. de Cruz-Lee never got any money in her hands. Mr. Lee assured her Mr. Bigelow made payments. She has no cheques, receipts or any evidence of money being transferred from Verdun Bigelow to Mr. Lee. Mr. Bigelow and these third parties ended up on title to her property. She believed there was a mortgage fraud which in 2007 forced them to move into a hotel.
153Ms. de Cruz-Lee denies that she lost her house due to her business ventures. It was because of erroneous documents found at Prouse, Dash and Crouch.
154Mr. Bhatia was impressed that Mr. Lee and her were in business together. In 2007, there was a fraud perpetrated by CIBC and Ms. de Cruz-Lee is not angry or upset; she just wants justice. She is upset that she lost her house. She filed a complaint with the Law Society and she trusted Mr. Lee. She denies being obsessed by the 2007 events.
155She has had two lawyers in these proceedings – Temilola Farinloye and then Mr. Trenholme. She has had bad experiences with lawyers in the past. She explained everything that happened to Mr. Trenholme and explained what she felt was fraud. Paragraphs 12 and 13 of Exhibit 34 were read to her. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that Mr. Trenholme turned around and designated the home matrimonial and they lied on the affidavit saying she did it. Mr. Trenholme did things outside of what he was supposed to do.
156Mr. Trenholme gave his Exhibit 34 opinion on December 27, 2013 after the house was sold and “he kept saying this now because he knows he already sold my house without my knowledge”.
157Mr. Trenholme was supposed to act on her behalf. She spoke to Justice Herold and said “how am I to fire him or to say anything because he was acting out of the best interests for the respondent and the fraudsters, not me”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “How can I …listen to his advice when on April 26 he put in a motion using my name without my knowledge?”
158Regarding Exhibit 32, the letter from Mr. Trenholme dated October 3, 2012, she asked him why he designated it as matrimonial, “the house is not matrimonial”.
159Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not provide the driver’s licence and social insurance card that appears in Exhibit 37. She did not consent to giving her house away period.
160At p. 3 of Exhibit 37 there is an acknowledgement and direction regarding the Lee/de Cruz-Lee transfer to Lee/Bhatia and the signature at the bottom looks like her signature on page 4 of Exhibit 37 the transfer, “In preparation” with a date of October 30, 2007. There are three signatures beside the crossing out of Lee/Bhatia as joint tenants and being Lee/Bhatia as tenants in common with Lee at 99 per cent interest and Bhatia as 1 per cent interest. She denies that any of those signatures are hers.
161She disagrees that the intent was to have Bhatia as 1 per cent owner and Lee as 99 per cent owner because “there was no intent for anyone to be on a mortgage”.
162Regarding the spousal consent at p. 11 of Exhibit 37, Ms. de Cruz-Lee denies signing the consent to the Exhibit 37 transaction. Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not consent.
163Exhibit 39 was registered as PR1393465 dated December 20, 2007 and says the transferors are Angela de Cruz-Lee/Larry Lee to Larry Lee/Prem Bhatia as joint tenants. It was suggested that the lawyer made a mistake in registering this document as the intent had been to have Lee/Bhatia as tenants in common. Ms. de Cruz-Lee agrees that the lawyer made a big mistake. However Ms. de Cruz-Lee denies that it was the intent to have tenants in common and she did not agree to it. Her intent was never to give the house up. The transfer was December 20, 2007 and the next day she moved back into the house. However, she did not know about the transfer. She moved back in with her daughter and Mr. Lee. She does not agree that the reason she was not put on title was because she would not qualify for a mortgage. She did not have bad credit. Mr. Bigelow sabotaged it.
164It was suggested that because of her bad credit, she would not qualify for a mortgage; she does not have a credit card because she cannot qualify for that. Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s response was, “Because I don’t have identification, yes.”
165She was locked out of the house on May 3, 2010 when she came home from surgery. She was escorted out by the police on October, 2010. She did not live in the home from 2010 until it was sold in 2013 due to Justice Ricchetti’s order. Mr. Lee paid all of the bills in that time period because he got an order from the judge.
166The trial was then adjourned to February 9. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was instructed by me that she was still in cross-examination and that she cannot discuss her evidence with Mr. Bhatia or anyone else. She agreed to do this. It would give her a rest.
February 9, 2015 – Continued Cross Examination of Ms. de Cruz-Lee
167Before cross-examination resumed, Ms. de Cruz-Lee advised that she had been in conversation with a federal MP, Joy Smith. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that Ms. Smith had advised her to speak to me immediately before the court case. I reminded her that she was under cross-examination and asked her to remember that previously I had told Ms. de Cruz-Lee that she was not to speak to anyone about the case. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that she did not talk about the case but Ms. Smith had said it was OK to tell me that she had been the victim of human trafficking.
168Cross-examination by Ms. Murthi then resumed.
169Ms. de Cruz-Lee confirmed that from December 2007 (when they moved back into their house) to 2010, when she lived in the home, Mr. Lee paid for all the bills in the house including utilities, mortgage, and property taxes.
170Ms. Murthi asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee numerous times whether or not Ms. de Cruz-Lee was working from 2007 to 20010. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was evasive in her answers; one of them was “I was working to get the fraud unravelled”. It was pointed out that her income tax says she only earned one dollar a year. Ms. de Cruz-Lee said she did earn an income and blamed Mr. Lee for preparing the income tax forms.
171Finally Ms. de Cruz-Lee conceded she could not make anything because everything in her house, including the business was taken.
172Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied having financial difficulties, she had $6 million in stock.
173Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she did not borrow money from Mr. Bhatia and “Mr. Bhatia will tell you that”.
174It was pointed out by Ms. Murthi that Mr. Bhatia did testify that Ms. de Cruz-Lee did borrow money from Mr. Bhatia for Michelle’s school uniforms.
175Ms. de Cruz-Lee said that it was Larry Lee who spoke with Mr. Bhatia. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that Mr. Bhatia was incorrect that Ms. de Cruz-Lee borrowed money from him. It was Larry Lee who borrowed money for school uniforms for Michelle.
176Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied borrowing any money from Prem Bhatia. She did not sign any papers or IOUs.
177Ms. de Cruz-Lee was shown Tab 1 of the Trial Record where Justice Ricchetti ordered, on November 9, 2010, that Mr. Lee have sole custody of the daughter, Michelle.
178When asked if she acknowledged the result of that motion, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that in his answer on January 8, 2011, Mr. Lee said he’s not the father, the house was not matrimonial and Mr. Lee at that time was on record at Land and Titles as owning illegally one per cent of the house and further that Matthew Stone signed as a Duty Counsel on the trial motion. Matthew Stone was a friend of hers from before her daughter was conceived.
179Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that Mr. Lee lied in the motion because he said he is Michelle’s father but his answer of January 8, 2011, says he is not the father and was not responsible for conceiving the child (the January 8, 2011, Answer at Tab 16 o the Trial Record says no such thing – it, at one page, lists the marriage date as May 27, 1995 and separation date as May 2, 1994, and Michelle’s birth date as September 11, 1994) and indicates at paragraph 12 that he has not been intimate with Ms. de Cruz-Lee since “around the time Michelle was conceived” and he lied about owning the house as the house was not fully in his name, he was a 1 per cent owner and she referred to the CRA paper from 2008 where Mr. Lee wrote CRA saying the house title is in error (Exhibits 32 and 37 in fact show that Mr. Lee and Mr. Bhatia owned the home in 2007 initially as joint tenants but this was corrected in 2012 to reflect Mr. Lee as 99 per cent owner and Mr. Bhatia as 1 per cent owner).
180Ms. de Cruz-Lee believed she was present for the motion dated December 2, 2010 which included a motion brought by her to return to the matrimonial home which was denied by Justice Lemon. Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s explanation was that she told her lawyer Temilola Farinloye that the house was not matrimonial and to strike Mr. Lee’s pleadings. Ms. de Cruz-Lee further explained, “They would not believe me because they couldn’t believe a story where a man would human traffic me. I have a label right now. This man basically made me work for nothing.”
181Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that her lawyer would not believe the house is not matrimonial, adding, “I can’t help it if my lawyer doesn’t take my directions…Both of my lawyers did not take my directions”.
182When directed to Justice Ricchetti’s order regarding sole custody, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s response was, “How can he have sole custody of a child, after three months, he says he is not the father and did not conceive.” Her explanation for Justice Ricchetti’s order was “he didn’t realize that the duty counsel was not a duty counsel but Mr. Lee’s classmate, Matthew Stone who should not have signed that paper…He was not objective, still is not objective and was present when my child was born”.
183It was pointed out that Ms. de Cruz-Lee had the option to fire her lawyer but she continued with Ms. Farinloye. Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s response was that she did not know you could fire your lawyer on the spot. “I had no idea about my rights because my rights for the last 32, 33 years were totally trampled on.”
184Exhibit 42 – Land Title Abstract for 52 Ravenscliffe – was then shown to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. At page three of Exhibit 42 on September 9, 2012, there is a notation “designation of matrimonial home”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee confirmed that Mr. Trenholme, her lawyer, did this designation.
185Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she did not ask Mr. Trenholme to do this designation and he did it without her consent and did not do it on her behalf. “He was supposed to uncover a fraud, multiple frauds” was her testimony.
186Exhibit 32 was shown to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. It is a letter to Ms. de Cruz-Lee dated October 3, 2012 from her lawyer, Mark Trenholme. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says that letter says Mr. Lee is a 1 per cent owner (in fact Exhibit 32 says the current title is 99 per cent by Mr. Lee and 1 per cent to Mr. Bhatia and simply corrected a previous error). I pointed this out to Ms. de Cruz-Lee and her response is that “He’s 99 per cent after July, 2012”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that Mark Trenholme designated the home as matrimonial and admonished Ms. Murthi for not looking at the fact that “Mr. Lee prior to all this was a 1 per cent owner”. (Exhibit 39 clearly indicates that the registered document shows that Mr. Lee and Mr. Bhatia on December 20, 2007 were registered as joint tenants). It was pointed out that Mr. Lee was never a 1 per cent owner and that Ms. de Cruz-Lee is talking about matters she is not being questioned about.
187Ms. de Cruz-Lee continued on about the correction of the previous error mentioned in Exhibit 32 and was finally directed to answer counsel’s questions.
188Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that the matrimonial designation put on by Mr. Trenholme was done without her permission and that Mr. Trenholme was doing things without her knowing. He put the matrimonial designation on without her knowing. She kept telling, everybody, “the house was mine”.
189She complained to the Law Society about Mr. Trenholme.
190Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied she has little involvement with her daughter since the separation. Ms. de Cruz-Lee has sent her cards and came to see her at the house but has been told there is a restraining order. Mr. Lee has told Michelle to call Ms. de Cruz-Lee dirty names. In response to the question, “So you don’t have a good relationship with your daughter?”, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s response was “Because she was lied to”…I always had a good relationship with my daughter until I got locked out”.
191Ms. Murthi asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee numerous times if she had a good relationship with her daughter after 2010 but Ms. de Cruz-Lee was evasive in her answers. Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s last answer was that Mr. Lee was illegally put on title in 2001. Finally I interjected and asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee to answer a simple question, “When she was out of the house, did she had a good relationship with her daughter or not?”
192Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she is sending cards but her daughter is not receiving them. Her daughter tells her to do as daddy says or “you will be deported”.
193Ms. de Cruz-Lee has provided no child support for Michelle since separation.
194Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she has had no income and that “How am I going to give money to a person who is not even the father now?”
195Mr. Lee has paid all the utilities for the house… “He got the house…stole the house from me.” She has paid no bills for the house. Mr. Lee has a modest retirement income of $29,000 annually.
196Ms. de Cruz-Lee was not aware the house was put for sale in 2013 due to the cost of the house being burdensome. Exhibit 54 was filed which is the respondent’s document brief. Tab D is the Agreement of Purchase and Sale dated February 28, 2013 for 56 Ravenscliffe. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did not see it until Ms. Murthi gave it to her.
197Tab 7 of the Trial Record is an order dated April 26, 2013 regarding Justice Price’s order with respect to a motion made by “Angel De Cruz” authorizing the sale of the home, removal of matrimonial designation and placing the net proceeds of the home sale into trust.
198Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s position is that, even though this was an order based on a motion brought by her lawyer, she did not consent to this motion and did not know that her lawyer brought the motion and was not present for it. She thought the house was under protection of the Public Guardian.
199Her position was that she wanted to buy the house; “I will protect it from any more frauds and I can always recoup the losses because I know for a fact the house was illegally given as a gift to Mr. Lee in 2001 by Kenneth James, who the RCMP incarcerated for mortgage fraud and money laundering”.
200Ms. de Cruz-Lee admitted that in 2013 she did not have a job. When asked how Ms. de Cruz-Lee could secure a mortgage when she didn’t work or had no income, Ms. de Cruz-Lee refused to answer the question insisting on returning to the April 26 motion before Justice Price. I interjected and told Ms. de Cruz-Lee she had to answer counsel’s questions and that Ms. de Cruz-Lee had a right to add something in re-examination. Ms. de Cruz-Lee admitted that she was on ODSP at the time. She was asked, “So you didn’t have any money to purchase the home and no way to making it?” Ms. de Cruz-Lee replied, “No. But I had help.”
201It was pointed out that her current landlord Mr. Wilker testified that she could not even pay him regularly the $200 a month she owed for rent. Her reply was, “No. He was talking about my tuition fees.” Ms. Murthi then indicated, “No. He said your rent. I asked him the question and he said that you sometimes pay your rent, that was what he said.” Her response was, “No” when asked if she remembered him saying that, she responded again, “No, he was nervous at that time and he said he’d made a mistake. You can call him back again.”
202When it was pointed out again that Mr. Wilker said sometimes she pays her rent of $200 a month, Ms. de Cruz-Lee replied that she needed to keep enough money based on the fact if she had to hire a lawyer and that he was in agreement that “I owed him my tuition fees”.
203It was pointed out that the property taxes, utilities and mortgage payments on the home would be well above the $200 a month that she could not even afford for rent. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was again evasive in answering this question referring to owing stocks, Navy contracts, looking for stolen money, Mr. Mand in 2007 not doing his job, etc. Again I interjected and asked her to answer the question, could she afford the expenses of the home at the time it was being sold, 2010.
204Her answer was, “As it exists, because I was defrauded, no, because I was trying to uncover the fraud”. Her objective was “to open up the fraud and see who stole my money and my wealth and all my belongings.”
205It was pointed out that Mr. Bhatia testified that the home had to be sold or everyone would lose their money, including Ms. de Cruz-Lee. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was again evasive and was asked, “Do you agree that the home needed to be sold, yes or no…?” Her answer was, “If it had to be sold, I would have bought it and I asked for it.”
206She was asked again whether the house needed to be sold and her response was again evasive and her answer was, “How can you sell a house when it’s fraudulently transferred…And Mr. Lee has no right to even sell the house because the title was illegally obtained by him.”
207Exhibit 54 Tab F indicates that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was unwilling to release $20,000 to Prem Bhatia from the house sale proceeds. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that it did and then went on a tangent talking about Rochelle Greene and fraud, when asked whether she refused to attend the real estate lawyer’s office, she denied refusing to attend at the office indicating that she had no idea the house was sold and never knew about the real estate lawyer until recently.
208It was pointed out her lawyer was well aware of the house sale and Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “No”… “No because I was not aware of it.” Had she been aware of the house sale, she would have told the real estate lawyer he had no right to hold the money as Mr. Lee and Mr. Bhatia are not the rightful owners.
209Regarding an emergency motion brought on May 2, 2013 before Justice van Rensburg for an order dispensing with signatures and consent of Ms. de Cruz-Lee so that the house sale would close, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated she was never served. When it was point out her lawyer Mr. Trenholme was served, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated that, “Mr. Trenholme was served. Mr. Trenholme did everything to benefit Mr. Lee…for a reason.”
210When then asked, “the order says that your signature was dispensed with, yes or no Ms. de Cruz-Lee?”, Ms. de Cruz-Lee went on another tangent with evasive answers regarding not knowing about the motion, Mr. Lee’s lawyer Rochelle Greene withdrawing from the case and not wanting payment from Mr. Lee, etc. I again interjected, “The answer is very simple, I mean do you see, she read out paragraph two do you see it.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did see it but continued speaking about Ms. Greene saying it was a fraud.
211When asked again about her signature being dispensed with, yes or no, Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified, “It was dispensed with…because somebody knew how to pull the tricks in court” and told Ms. Murthi, “Why are you wasting the court’s time when you know this is a fraud?”
212Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that the house was sold without her knowledge: “It was done in court without my knowledge.”
213When Ms. de Cruz-Lee was shown Tab E of Exhibit 54 regarding the sale of the home, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was evasive again in responding to counsel’s question insisting upon introducing hearsay statements allegedly made by Mr. Trenholme at the time that the house was under Public Guardian Protection and she was not aware of any house sale details. When shown Tab A of Exhibit 54 which is a Trust Ledger Statement showing the disbursement of funds from the house sale, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was referred to the payment of $302,552.52 to pay off the TD mortgage. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “Why was there a mortgage?...There was never supposed to be a mortgage.”
214The Trust Ledger outlines various payments made upon sale of the house with brokerage fees, legal fees, court order of $1,500 dated November 27, 2013, with $51,292.81 left over, which is being held in trust.
215Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s response was that, “So in essence, he stole my house and paid all his bills”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked why she was not invited to the sale and again went off on a tangent about Rochelle Greene not wanting to be part of the fraud.
216At the bottom of the ledger statement, what remains of the house sale is $52,992.61 in trust.
217Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied that the dispute at trial is regarding the $52,992.61. She testified, “The dispute is who owns the house.”
218Ms. de Cruz-Lee then went on another tangent regarding her buying the house in 1996 and denying a gift to Mr. Lee in 2001; “the paperwork consented, when I didn’t even know.”
219Ms. Murthi asked about whether her daughter was an adult (she is) and pointed out that whether Mr. Lee is a good parent or not is irrelevant. Ms. de Cruz-Lee then went off on another tangent indicating that it is very relevant, “when I was 17 and he was 42…it’s very relevant because you know why, that’s called criminal”.
220When asked if they had been separated for four years now, “We have been separated since 1989, when it took five police officers to save me from him killing me and then he came back to the house”.
221Ms. de Cruz-Lee referred back to Mr. Lee’s Answer dated January 8, 2011 where “Mr. Lee said he separated from me prior to the conception of my child…because he admitted in his answer he is not the father.” When it was pointed out that the house has been sold, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “he took my home so he could get my child and get other young girls.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee added, “The home that I bought for myself, stolen from me, yes sold because…he knows lawyers who knew how to manipulate the tricks of land titles”.
222When it was pointed out that, out of the remaining approximate $54,000, $20,000 was possibly owing to Mr. Bhatia’s estate, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “Mr. Bhatia’s son also said that Mr. Lee signed for it and Mr. Lee asked for the money. I never asked Mr. Prem Bhatia for anything. And if I ever asked and if we have to for a Dollar Store, whatever, I paid him by cash after.”
223When asked if Ms. de Cruz-Lee does not think she should share it with Mr. Lee, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated her position was “the house was transferred illegally…that $52,000 should be given back to the Liburds and my house should be given back to me because the house was illegally transferred as of December, 2001.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee added, “What he has done is criminal”.
224When told that Ms. de Cruz-Lee has provided no support to her daughter, Ms. de Cruz-Lee went off on another tangent regarding fraud, Mark Trenholme being asked to open the fraud, the 2001 lawyer being in jail for mortgage fraud and money laundering.
225Ms. de Cruz-Lee denied that she works very little and indicated that “Exhibit 1 and 2, purchase and sales agreement, I am owed $500,000. My house was to be paid for.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee agreed that she has never been paid but blamed it on Mr. Lee who was, “working behind and doing all the fraud”.
226When it was pointed out that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was not listening to counsel’s questions, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “you’re suggesting I worked very little, no. I was the main person for 4047206 Canada Incorporated. I have a purchase and sales agreement.”
227When it was pointed out that after Ms. Bhatia’s $20,000 is taken away, Mr. Lee and Ms. de Cruz-Lee are fighting over $34,000, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “You never gave me a chance to say whether I earned a little or a lot. I have a U.S. Navy contract worth millions. I have a purchase and sales agreement that I provided as an exhibit where I’ve earned $500,000 plus $38,000 in income, which Mr. Lee was supposed to pay.”
228When counsel returned to what was being fought over was $34,000, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “I am still stuck in the fact there was a fraud, I was exposing it all. I did not, I was not aware the house was being sold.”
229Ms. de Cruz-Lee does not agree that the money should be shared, “It should be given back to the Liburds because they bought the house under false pretense”.
Re-Examination
230Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that Pradeep Bhatia stated they were a couple but he could not give that information as he was not a therapist, not a psychiatrist, does not have a girlfriend or wife but he is close to his mother.
231Ms. de Cruz-Lee repeated that she was unaware of the Justice Price Motion and went into significant detail regarding Rochelle Greene’s removal from the record and subsequent non-payment as indicated in Tabs 6 and 9 of the Trial Brief.
232Ms. de Cruz-Lee reiterated her evidence regarding not consenting to the sale of the house in 2013 or its transfer in 2001. She indicated she can make money and has $500,000 owed to her by Mr. Lee whose partner is Mr. Bigelow. She pointed out that she is owed $500 pursuant to Justice Gray at Tab 2 of the Trial Brief.
233She continued to deny she consented to any of the land transfer records that say she consented. She indicated, “I never consented. And I cannot trust Mark Trenholme because what he did was all to prevent the fraud from happening…and when I spoke to Federal MP, Joy Smith, she said I should be telling Your Honour that I am a victim of human trafficking. My CRA documents all say I have no income because Mr. Lee takes all my income. He even took my house which I bought because he doesn’t see me as a human being. For 32 years, I was 17 years old, he was 42 years old. He forced me to have an abortion when I came to Canada…he’s doing everything without my consent”.
234She confirmed that she was never given a chance to consent. “I never consented to the house being sold. And all the directions for the motion on April 26 (2013) was done without my knowledge.”
235Ms. de Cruz-Lee filed Exhibit 55 which is a land transfer document dated 2013-04-22 wherein it is indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee is Larry Lee’s spouse and consents to the sale of 56 Ravenscliffe. She repeated that she did not consent and had no idea.
236Exhibit 56 is a land transfer document dated 2012-07-17 transferring 56 Ravenscliffe from Bhatia and Lee to Bhatia as tenant in common 1 per cent and Larry Lee as tenant in common 99 per cent. The document indicates that Judith de Cruz-Lee is Larry Lee’s spouse and has consented to this transaction. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she did not consent.
237Exhibit 57 was introduced. It is a request for taxpayer relief by Larry Lee in 2008 due to extraordinary circumstances which were listed as mortgage fraud on home, family environmental sensitivity and medical costs.
238Exhibit 58 is an envelope addressed to Angela de Cruz-Lee, Director, International Road Flow Inc. This was submitted as evidence that Ms. de Cruz-Lee did in fact work.
239Tab 5 of the Trial Record is dated March 14, 2013, the same date that is on the Real Estate Brokerage letter that is included at Tab D of the Document Brief. Tab 5 of the Trial Record is an endorsement regarding a case conference held on March 14, 2013. On this date, March 14, 2013, Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she came to court, she was told by Mark Trenholme that the house was protected by the Public Guardian (Exhibit 34 – the affidavit of Mark Trenholme filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates at paragraph 23 that neither the Office of the Children’s Lawyer nor the Public Guardian and Trustee is involved in this matter). She did not know that he allowed Mr. Lee to file an answer and financial statement. She did not know about this until counsel Rupa disclosed it to her. I asked, “So did you know about this case conference?” Her answer was no. (Exhibit 34 – affidavit of Mr. Trenholme filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated an email sent to her on November 19, 2013, detailing a summary of extensive reporting letters).
240At Tab 3 of the Trial Record, Justice Lemon on December 2, 2010, ordered that the respondent Mr. Lee was to file his answer and financial statement by December 10, 2010, failing which the applicant may move to strike his pleadings to date. The answer at Tab 16 of the Trial Record is dated January 8, 2011, but bears a stamp by the Superior Court filing office of April 18, 2013.
241Ms. de Cruz-Lee says her lawyer did not strike the pleadings and told her to wait until a trial. “My rights were violated” was her claim.
242Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she pleaded with Ms. Farinloye to strike the pleadings but Ms. Farinloye failed to do it and Ms. Farinloye would not believe her that “I was basically enslaved by Mr. Lee and she would not believe that a woman could buy a house on her own.”
243Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained that there was never to be a TD mortgage or a CIBC mortgage. She claimed, “There was never to be a mortgage. There was only to be a lawsuit against CIBC because there was never a CIBC mortgage on my house.”
244Ms. de Cruz-Lee was told that the money regarding the TD mortgage was to be put in court and the house was supposed to go in her name but instead they put Mr. Prem Bhatia at 99 per cent and Larry Lee 1 per cent in December 2007 and then in July of 2012, they gave Mr. Lee 99 per cent and Mr. Bhatia 1 per cent.
245Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintained she was owed a lot of money and the house was paid for. If the purchase and sales agreement for Ex. 4(A)&(B) was followed through by the lawyers she would never had to suffer a mortgage fraud and have her house taken away. The true person behind all the fraud is Mr. Lee.
246Ms. de Cruz-Lee again relied on Mr. Lee’s Answer at Tab 16 of the Trial Record as proof he is not Michelle’s father and should not have been allowed to file a motion on November 9, 2010 using Matthew Stone, who she knew before her daughter’s birth, as duty counsel.
247Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “Your Honour, I want a DNA done on Mr. Lee and every lawyer that’s involved in this case because they seem to have some interest in protecting Mr. Lee. Money was transacted on paper that I never got a cent on.”
248She continued, “My prior lawyers were hiding a lot of information from me and I brought a motion under s. 25(1) for fraud, which Justice Lemon said to bring up at trial.”
249Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated, “Your Honour, basically all the paperwork to do with the sale of the house in 2013, I was not aware of.”
250Ms. de Cruz-Lee was permitted to recall Pradeep Bhatia regarding a conversation Mr. Bhatia had with Mr. Lee in the court hallway.
251Mr. Bhatia indicated he testified on November 18 and returned a few days later to conclude his evidence. As court was concluding in the afternoon, Mr. Lee approached him and told Mr. Bhatia that he is flat broke. Mr. Bhatia said he just wanted his $20,000 back. Mr. Lee told Mr. Bhatia that if he wins the case, Mr. Bhatia will get his money back in full. In cross-examination, Mr. Bhatia confirmed that all of his previous testimony was the truth.
Michelle de Cruz-Lee
252She is 20 years old.
253Angela de Cruz-Lee is her mother and Larry Lee is her father.
254She works at a warehouse, packing boxes.
255She testified she has no relationship with her mother.
256Her mother is very abusive and very controlling.
257She gave, as an example, an incident when she was 13. Her aunt came to visit and was to take Michelle on a mini vacation to Niagara Falls, Ontario. Her mother did not approve of it whatsoever. When she returned home, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was yelling at Mr. Lee to drag here into the house and berated both of them to listen to her (page 119 of the Feb. 9 transcript).
258Larry Lee was a good parent but he was very submissive to her mother’s demands.
259Larry Lee was required to meet Michele’s mother’s demands about raising her and demands with the house and if he did not, usually fights would ensue.
260During the marriage her mother was not working.
261Her father worked a couple of jobs and at around the age of 65, he had applied for his old age pension.
262Her parents' relationship was very toxic and terrible.
263An example of toxic and terrible was when, after they had left the house in 2007, her mother blamed most of it on her father and there was a dispute that happened in the car when they were taking the dogs for a walk and her mother somehow managed to kick him while he was in the driver’s seat. It happened in 2007 in winter time when they were living at the Howard Johnson.
264Regarding Verdun Bigelow, he was successful in the mining industry and he was one of Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s clients. Ms. de Cruz-Lee believed that Mr. Lee worked some dead end jobs and she wanted to make money quicker than that and so she dragged Mr. Lee into it.
265Exhibit 42 shows the house was transferred to Verdun Bigelow and also later to Ulrich Kretschmar.
266Ulrich Kretschmar was another one of Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s clients. Michelle believes Ms. de Cruz-Lee had an affair with him because Ms. de Cruz-Lee would go to his personal home for days on end and would not come home for a while.
267Mr. Lee had only met Mr. Kretschmar a couple of times and Ms. de Cruz-Lee was mainly dealing with everything.
268In 2007, Ms. de Cruz-Lee fumbled a mining agreement and they got kicked out of the house. Ms. de Cruz-Lee made mistakes; she was not very experienced in the mining industry and she managed to lose their house.
269After they moved out in 2007, they spent a couple of months at the house of Helen Mitchell and Walter Mitchell and after that, they lived at Howard Johnson.
270They ended up returning to the house. Her father and Prem Bhatia were put on title because Prem had better credit than Mr. Lee and her mother had no credit, and she believed that by putting Prem on title, that they could get a better mortgage, so they both went on title to get a mortgage, so they could return to the house.
271Prem Bhatia was the father of Pradeep Bhatia who was a neighbour and that’s how she met Prem Bhatia.
272Exhibit 39 was shown to Michelle. Exhibit 39 is a land register transfer dated December 20, 2007 on 56 Ravenscliffe. The transferors were Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee and the transferees are Larry Lee 99 per cent and Prem Bhatia 1 per cent as joint tenants.
273Exhibit 37 is a similar transfer dated October 30, 2007. The transferors are Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee and the transferees are Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia as tenants in common, 99 per cent for Larry Lee and 1 per cent for Prem Bhatia. The changes on the document are initialed by Larry Lee, Angela de Cruz-Lee and Prem Bhatia.
274Michelle Lee has seen Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature before and the A is the first letter for her signature, that her mom usually uses. The double L is Larry Lee. The bottom one is Prem.
275On the last page, there is a confirmation by Ms. de Cruz-Lee that she is the spouse of Larry Lee and consents to the transaction. She recognizes the signature of Angela de Cruz-Lee as belonging to her mother. She recognizes and has seen her mother’s signature before. The lawyer acting was Maurizio Vani. Michelle was taken to his office by her parents when she was very young.
276Exhibit 32 was shown to Michelle. It is a letter dated October 3, 2012 to Angela de Cruz-Lee by Mr. Trenholme, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s lawyer. Parts of it refer to the July 2012 transfer, correcting title to reflect a previous error, were read to Michelle.
277Michelle indicates that her mother and father stopped living together as husband and wife in 2010. The circumstances of her mother leaving the house were as follows: her mother and father had gotten into a fight and Ms. de Cruz-Lee phoned the police. CAS got involved and found out she brought her boyfriends to stay in the house and CAS decreed it was an unhealthy environment for a child under 16 and CAS suggested that Ms. de Cruz-Lee either be removed or Michelle would be taken into protective custody. Michelle was under 16 at the time.
278Her mother started bringing boyfriends into the house in Michelle’s first year of high school. It was in 2008-2009 when she was 14, 15.
279After her mother left the house, her father was the primary caregiver. Her mother provided no support after the separation.
280Her father paid all the bills on 56 Ravenscliffe. They left there in 2013. They moved because it was getting too expensive.
281Tab D of Exhibit 54 – the Document Brief – was shown to Michelle. It is an agreement of purchase and sale – the sellers are Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia to the buyers Kenneth and Robin Nichols.
282Tab 5 of Exhibit 54 indicates that Prem Bhatia was to receive $20,000 from the house sale but Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not agree to release it and that amount was held back from the sale proceeds.
283The $20,000 were funds that were borrowed from Prem Bhatia because they were in a tight situation with money. She does not know who borrowed the funds. She would say both parents.
284Parts of Tab 8 were read into the record. This is the emergency order made by Justice van Rensburg authorizing the sale of the home, dispensing with Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature and ordering costs to Mr. Lee from Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s share of the house proceeds.
285Tab A of the document brief was shown to Michelle. It indicates $52,992.61 is being held in trust from the $372,237.88 received from the house sale.
286Tab E of the document brief shows $11,583 was paid to Kingsway Real Estate Brokerage.
287Her father wants her to go to college and he is going to put the remaining house sale proceeds into an account for Michelle.
288Physically her father is okay but mentally, his long term memory is not good but he remembers some things.
289Mr. Lee is 73 and has had issues with memory for a couple of years.
290Tab 16 of the Trial Record is Mr. Lee’s Answer, dated January 8, 2011. The date of marriage is listed as 1995. The date of separation is May 2, 1994. Michelle testified that those dates are not accurate.
Cross-Examination
291Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that Michelle was her baby, that’s Baybe, that’s what she normally called her.
292Michelle responded, “I prefer not to be called by that name”.
293A number of questions were asked regarding Michelle’s last name.
294Ms. de Cruz-Lee then asked Michelle who her teacher was. Michelle indicated it was a lady through an online school.
295I pointed out to Ms. de Cruz-Lee that this questioning was very upsetting to Michelle and I asked her to ask relevant questions regarding who owns the house and how it should be split up. I asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee to be sensitive to Michelle and I asked Michelle to answer her mother’s questions. Michelle indicated she understood.
296Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked Michelle if she was skilled to give an answer that a person is abusive and controlling and Michelle answered, “Yes”. Further questions were asked of Michelle regarding her expertise in this area and Michelle indicated that in her eyes abusive and controlling means physically and verbally assaulting a person and controlling means everything has to be your way or the highway. Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “You gave an example now that I kicked your father in the head”. Michelle indicated she never testified where he was kicked. She just stated he was kicked. The transcript reveals this to be accurate.
297Ms. de Cruz-Lee then asked where Larry Lee was kicked. Michelle responded that, “It’s obvious that you remembered the date and you said, “in the head” which I had refrained from saying but thanks to you, you have stated where he was kicked”. Michelle confirmed that he was kicked in the head. It was in the car. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was upset. Michelle was sitting in the backseat with the dogs. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was upset over something she did not get and got very upset with Mr. Lee and kicked him in the head.
298Michelle could not say which foot – all she saw was her foot flying into the air and connect with her father’s head. Michelle did not phone the police because she was too scared.
299Michelle knew about the transfer to Bigelow in 2003 and legal work, when she was 10, because her mother would not leave her alone at home and brought her to lawyer’s offices. Michelle says her mother brought her everywhere but she did not stay at Kretschmar’s home when her mother went there because her father objected to Michelle staying in strange men’s houses.
300It was suggested to Michelle that Ms. de Cruz-Lee brought Michelle everywhere because she is her home school teacher and was brought everywhere with her mother because Ms. de Cruz-Lee had to protect her. Michelle countered, “Hence, this is your controlling attitude coming forth.”
301Michelle knows Ms. de Cruz-Lee spent some days at Kretschmar’s home because Ms. de Cruz-Lee would tell Larry Lee where she was going.
302In 2007, they lived in a hotel; Michelle was 12, 13 years old.
303Ms. de Cruz-Lee brought Michelle to see the lawyer, Maurizio Vani with Larry Lee and Ms. de Cruz-Lee. She could not remember if Prem Bhatia was there.
304Michelle knows Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature because she has seen her mother sign documents and remembers her signature.
305In 2007, Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not sell anything; she fumbled a mining agreement and lost the house and they were forced to stay elsewhere. When asked about the CIBC law suit, Michelle indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee fumbled the mining agreement and because she did not want to take the blame, Ms. de Cruz-Lee tried to put the blame on CIBC and say they put a fraudulent mortgage on the house. Nobody has to tell Michelle that.
306The land titles documents involving Maurizio Vani and the house before 2007 were spread all over the kitchen table and Ms. de Cruz-Lee would talk openly about it. In 2007, Michelle had read that the house was transferred by Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee to Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee. Ms. de Cruz-Lee openly gave her home. Mr. Lee has mentioned mortgage fraud because he was very submissive to Ms. de Cruz-Lee and her demands, so if Ms. de Cruz-Lee said “mortgage fraud”, he said “mortgage fraud”.
307Mr. Vani was hired for another one off Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s mineral mining schemes. Mr. Mand was a lawyer involved with her parents but she could not remember details.
308At the recess, Michelle read Exhibits 32 and 37. Exhibit 37 is a letter from Mark Trenholme, dated September 18, 212 to Maurizio Vani. It has a copy of a driver’s licence in the name of “Angela Judith De Cruz-Lee” issued 1999 and expiring in 2003.
309Michelle says that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was at all the lawyer’s meetings. It was suggested that if Ms. de Cruz-Lee was there, in 2007 and 2012, an up to date licence would have been used. Michelle explained that the reason that the driver’s licence is expired is that Ms. de Cruz-Lee never got around to renewing it and did not want to retake everything which is why “dad” drove most of the time. Since she is not a citizen, she does not have any other form of identification.
310Exhibit 37 has Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature on it. Michelle has seen her mother sign 10, maybe even 50 documents and her signature is always the same. Exhibit 37 has Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s social insurance number and driver’s licence.
311Micelle has not seen her mother in five years except when Ms. de Cruz-Lee came to see her on Easter and “you know how well that ended”.
312In 2007, when Ms. de Cruz-Lee kicked Larry Lee, Michelle was in school and was often at the school office, but Michelle was too afraid to talk to them or the police. Michelle indicated when you have a controlling and abusive parent, she as a child was scared and badly affected and caused incredible damage to her.
313Ms. de Cruz-Lee then stated three separate times she was 17 too.
314When Michelle was home schooled, the grading system was her mother’s and it was comparable to nothing. Later there was on-line schooling through Ministry of B.C. schooling and Michelle did very well. Prior to that, her mother home schooled her and she did not have any grading system.
315Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked if Michelle missed days out of school. Michelle answered, “The only reason why I missed a couple of days here and there” was because her mother had shown up a couple times in short cocktail dresses in high heels and embarrassed her publicly in front of a lot of people and Michelle then refused to attend school.
316I at this time, for the first of many times in this cross-examination, questioned the relevance of this questioning and further advised Ms. de Cruz-Lee that lawyers generally have a rule of thumb that you do not ask questions that you do not know the answers to because you get bad answers; and that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was getting bad answers, “so I don’t know really if you really want to go down this road.”
317Ms. de Cruz-Lee ignored me completely, as she did with my other admonishments, and continued to continue to rush down that road.
318Ms. de Cruz-Lee then referred to Exhibit 49, the school attendance summary for Michelle de Cruz-Lee. The summary indicates Michelle missed 108 classes in 2010. Ms. de Cruz-Lee suggested that this occurred because Michelle did not have her mother’s guidance. Michelle’s response was that her absences were due to her mother making unplanned visits to her high school wearing inappropriate clothing and publicly embarrassing Michelle in front of everyone, teachers, students, even police officers.
319I then interjected “All right. You asked your questions. You got your answer. And I told you – it didn’t help you – so you should be careful. We’re really getting far afield from the issue here.”
320Ms. de Cruz-Lee showed Michelle a document she prepared when she was six years old and suggested Michelle was a smart kid. Michelle agreed, she was smart and still is.
321Ms. de Cruz-Lee then asked if Michelle had graduated high school yet. Michelle indicated that she had not been attending high school because her mother follows her to every single high school and won’t leave her alone. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked “Why would a mother follow her daughter around school” which left her wide open for Michelle’s answer, “Because you have nothing better to do with your life”. Her mother followed her in 2010, 2011 and 2012.
322Ms. de Cruz-Lee directed Michelle to Larry Lee’s Answer dated January 8, 2011 at Tab 16 of the Trial Record at point 12. Point 12 indicates, “The respondent has not been intimate with the applicant around the time their daughter was conceived and believes that this is the date of separation.” Michelle responded, “That’s disgusting, to say the least and I really don’t want to read that.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates, “It’s disgusting”. Michelle responded, “Thinking of your two parents in a room conceiving you, yeah, it’s kind of gross.” Michelle did not want to read it.
323I interjected but Ms. de Cruz-Lee then read point 12 into the record.
324I then indicated that it was unfair to ask Michelle what was going on when she was conceived as she would not know. A better question would be when the parents separated.
325Michelle testified that they separated in the summer of 2010 before her birthday. Ms. de Cruz-Lee then asked Michelle to name other men who came to live in their house.
326Michelle responded that Tyler Mitchell was her best friend from high school. Tyler had been kicked out of his house and Michelle asked her mom and dad if it was okay if he stays on the couch for a couple of days until he can get up to stay with his father. Tyler’s father came down and “you went into a big spiel about how he was the man of your dreams and you had saw him in your dreams and the next day, you were upstairs with Tyler’s father.”
327Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked further questions about meeting with Tyler Mitchell’s father. I interjected and asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee how this questioning was helping her. However the questioning went on. Michelle added that after meeting Mr. Mitchell and bringing him upstairs, “he was moved in and living with us”.
328There then followed an argument about Ms. de Cruz-Lee not allowing strange people in the house and Tyler must have done something wrong if he got kicked out of the house and I interjected that this sounded like a family fight. The issue at this time was there was an allegation that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was bringing men into the house. And she wanted examples. She got one. I asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee if she wanted more. Michelle indicated, “You want more. I have a good memory.”
329Ms. de Cruz-Lee then referred to Mr. Lee’s answer where he stated that the date of separation was May 2, 1994, which Michelle could not answer because she was conceived at that time.
330Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “She is saying that I brought people. I have a right, if I was separated. And Mr. Lee was staying because he had nowhere else to go.”
331The Tyler Mitchell incident happened in 2008-2009 – she was just beginning grade 9 in high school. This was before the physical separation in 2010.
332Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked if Michelle talked to her mother this year on the phone. Michelle said no. Ms. de Cruz-Lee suggested Michelle phoned on June 4, 2014. Ms. de Cruz-Lee said she had a tape recording of the conversation and suggested Michelle threatened her mother with deportation. It was suggested that Michelle phoned and told Ms. de Cruz-Lee to do what daddy wants or Ms. de Cruz-Lee would be deported. Michelle could not remember doing any of that.
333Ms. de Cruz-Lee had a recording on her cell phone. It was not disclosed to the other side. The recording on the phone was not audible and was not in a form that could be tendered as an exhibit. There was no transcript. The recording was 28 minutes and 39 seconds. The cross-examination had to be adjourned to the next day in order to get the recording in an admissible form.
Cross-Examination Continued – February 10, 2015
334Ms. de Cruz-Lee revisited the issue of calling Michelle either by Michelle or Baybe. I indicated that Michelle wants to be called by her adult name Michelle and that question was answered yesterday.
335The entire tape was then played for its entire length of about 30 minutes. I observed Michelle during the playing of the tape. She was visibly very, very upset and was crying throughout the playing of it. After I asked if she was alright to continue with questioning, Michelle indicated she was alright to proceed. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “Are you okay to continue, sweetie?”
336Ms. de Cruz-Lee then asked her about her name and that she said it was Michelle.
337In the recording, Michelle is referred to as Baybe.
338Ms. de Cruz-Lee then indicates, “I’ve been doing everything, Baybe, to try to get you not to be another victim.” Michelle refused to answer this non-question.
339Michelle indicated that over half of the taped conversation was getting her email password back but Ms. de Cruz-Lee would not give it to her because it was linked to Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s YouTube music account. Michelle pointed out that it was her account, under her previous name and had some specific information she should not be privy to. Michelle indicated that just because somebody leaves something doesn’t mean it’s yours to take.
340In the taped conversation Michelle suggested that Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee should just split the house proceeds. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked if Michelle remembered the day Michelle met her at Tim Horton’s in Waterloo. Michelle responded, “The day you attacked me. Yes.” When Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked why Michelle was attacked, Michelle responded that Michelle had asked for her grandmother’s ring and Ms. de Cruz-Lee got very upset, stating it was hers because she put all the effort into taking care of it.
341Questions were asked about a video at Tim Horton’s. Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “Baybe, there’s no video on there.” Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “If there was a case where I was scratching your face, I’m sure they would have charged me.” Up to this point there had been no mention of Ms. de Cruz-Lee scratching Michelle. Michelle did not press charges because she feels sorry for her mother. Ms. de Cruz-Lee suggested that in the Tim Horton’s bathroom, Michelle took her mother’s hairpin off and said she looked better that way. Michelle replied, “I was probably trying to be a nice child. I didn’t realize then that you were the mother of all evil.”
342Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “…I said to you, Baybe, I said don’t touch my hair – you ripped it and you went, here, that’s better. Is that what a child does to her mother.” Michelle indicated she could not remember. All she remembers is being traumatized by her mother.
343Michelle indicated that “from a woman that abused children like that, you’re so lucky to be standing.”
344Ms. de Cruz-Lee suggested that at the previous recess, Michelle lunged at her. Michelle indicated that from a traumatized child, would that be the wrong thing to do. Michelle lowered her arms and did not hurt her mother. Michelle explained she was crying during the playing of the tape because she felt that her mother was trying to traumatize her and get her off the stand, or she would have a better chance at getting at Larry Lee.
345Ms. de Cruz-Lee then indicated “The judge has been very good to us, Baybe”. Michelle indicated that the judge has been very good to you because “you are rotten to the very core”.
346There was some type of objection by Ms. de Cruz-Lee and I pointed out, for the seventh time by my calculation, that Michelle was not doing anything improper, she’s giving answers. I said, “I don’t think they’re very good answers from your point of view but you seem determined to keep asking the, so go ahead.”
347Michelle was asked if she had stated her mother was too busy to talk to her. Michelle indicated that, “No, as a matter of fact, I think you have nothing better to do then talk to me because nobody else will talk to you.”
348At some point Michelle forwarded a letter that her mother could not come within the school and could not ask for information about Michelle. It was written by her father Larry Lee.
349Ms. de Cruz-Lee thought the letter was filed as Exhibit 25. Exhibit 25 was not the letter. She stated, “Now I don’t know where it went.” Michelle could not remember the exact year because she gave it to multiple schools.
350Michelle remembers her 16th birthday. Pictures of a birthday party were shown to Michelle. Ms. de Cruz-Lee could not find the exhibit saying it was Exhibit 50-46. Ms. Murthi pointed out it was Exhibit 52. The photos show partying with beer bottles and are dated September 12, 2010. Michelle indicated she would love to use the beer bottles on her mother. Alcohol is seen in the pictures – Michelle indicated, “Lots of it – good to forget you”. The pages on Exhibit 52 were not numbered and were required to be numbered to make sense of the cross-examination. I numbered them. After that was done, Ms. de Cruz-Lee decided she wanted to use the clearer coloured photos that were buried in the voluminous continuing record in a box. That required us to halt the proceedings and search for the coloured photos. I pointed out that a two day trial was now in our fourth day and for a 5 day trial fighting for $52,000, the loser is going to lose all their share of the house. I asked Ms. de Cruz-Lee to make some effort to expedite the matter but in my opinion, this had no impact on her and the hunt for the clear coloured photos buried in a box of documents was proceeded with. They were found eventually and entered as Exhibit 52(A) and put in the same order as Exhibit 52.
351The photos show Michelle smoking; there is a bong in the photos. Michelle says she is smoking weed. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had in the past asked Michelle to buy weed for her, so she should know what it is in the photos. One photo showed a person smoking a bong in front of 56 Ravenscliffe.
352While Michelle was looking at one of the photos, Ms. de Cruz-Lee started to approach Michelle; Michelle stated, “Don’t approach me, please”. To which Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated, “I need to see it, sweetie.” One of the pictures shows a picture of Michelle’s tattoo on her back. She got the tattoo sometime after her 16th birthday.
353Michelle indicated that her mother is the reason as to why she drinks. Michelle stated she goes to therapy, she drinks, she smokes. She stated, “You know what, it sucks because I have a shitty mother.”
354Michelle was reminded of her testimony as to how she got Mr. Lee involved in mining. Michelle was shown Exhibit 5, a resume of Mr. Lee. The resume refers to mining experience from “2002 to present” and gives details. Michelle indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee brought Mr. Lee into the mining business. Michelle disagreed that the resume shows him to be an expert.
355In response to Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s questions, Michelle indicated that Mr. Bigelow and Larry Lee did not know each other well. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was the one that mostly went to go see him, drove around in his car and went on mining adventures with him.
356Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, “Who’s he?” and Michelle responded, “Okay, I’m guessing you forgot how many people you slept with.”
357Ms. de Cruz-Lee objected to these answers and for the eighth and ninth times, I advised Ms. de Cruz-Lee she should have a pretty good idea before asking questions as to what the answers are and if she is not sure, she should be careful because she could get an answer that could devastate her case.
358Michelle was aware that Mr. Bigelow and Mr. Lee were partners because Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed documents and told them that it would be a good idea. Because Ms. de Cruz-Lee was the brains behind everything… “You introduced him to everything…you showed him what to do.”
359Ms. de Cruz-Lee again returned to Tab 16 of the trial record – Mr. Lee’s answer – which contains mistaken dates as to marriage and separation: married on May 27, 1995 and separated on May 2, 1994. Michelle indicated her father’s memory is failing – the marriage date was May 24 – May 27, 1985 and 1994 is Michelle’s birth year.
360Ms. de Cruz-Lee again asked Michelle to return to point 12 and read it. Ms. Murthi objected as this was gone over the day earlier.
361Ms. de Cruz-Lee continued on and indicated that if separation was at the time of conception in 1993, that she reads it to be that Michelle Is not even his biological daughter.
362Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked Michelle if she has been coached. Michelle responded, “By my mother, yes.” and then stated, “I’ve not been coached by anybody but I was coached by you to lie for a lot of things…”
363Michelle’s cross-examination was then completed.
364Ms. de Cruz-Lee then engaged in a long discussion. She wanted to call a Mr. Singer, a lawyer. He was not on her original list of witnesses. Mr. Singer was not in court. She had communicated with him but had not subpoenaed him. I ruled she had months to make arrangements to have him attend and he had made no commitments to come. I ruled that I could not order him to come at the last second as he had other commitments to clients. That closed Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s case.
365Ms. Murthi did not make an opening statement and agreed that her position is that it is a joint property and should be split 50/50.
Larry Lee
366He is 73 years old.
367He receives a military pension of $29,000 per year.
368In 1982 he met the applicant in Malaysia.
369In 1985 he married the applicant in May. The main, sole source of income during his marriage was his pension.
370Ms. de Cruz-Lee was never employed during the marriage.
371His health is bad and he just got out of hospital.
372He has one child, Michelle de Cruz-Lee, who was born September 11, 1994.
373During the majority of their marriage, they lived at 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton, Ontario.
374He provided the down payment, utilities and property taxes.
375Exhibit 42, the land abstract registry, at page 3, shows in November 2003 a transfer to Angela de Cruz-Lee to Verdun Bigelow.
376Angela de Cruz-Lee wanted to get into the mining business and Verdun Bigelow supplied an avenue to that and it was a bad choice.
377His involvement was “I had title to the home and … with Verdun Bigelow, was just trying to confirm what he was doing and what the mining business was about.”
378They got into financial difficulties and they had to remortgage with CIBC.
379He knows that Verdun Bigelow got on tile but “got a blank” as to how that happened.
380The reason the property was put in his wife’s name in 1996 was they had a child and he was not sure of his medical shape.
381In 2011, it was put into both their names to secure the property.
382In March 2007 there was a transfer from Angela de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee to Ulrich Kretschmar.
383Kretschmar was a professor at U of T in geophysics and was also in the mining business.
384He met Ulrich Kretschmar through his wife and has no idea how she met him.
385The reason it was put in Kretschmar’s name was that Angela wanted to start a business and Kretschmar was reasonably good. He was a good reference.
386Exhibit 4A, the Agreement of Purchase and Sale was shown to Mr. Lee. Exhibit 4A shows Verdun Bigelow and Larry Lee as purchasers and seller agent as Angela de Cruz-Lee or Ulrich Kretschmar. It is signed by Verdun Bigelow, Larry Lee and Angela as seller agent/owner.
387Exhibit 4B is dated January 8, 2004 with Angel de Cruz-Lee as purchaser and Ulrich Kretschmar as seller. It has a list of mining leases. It is signed by Angela de Cruz-Lee, Ulrich Kretschmar and Larry Lee as witness.
388After the home was transferred to Kretschmar, they were in trouble on it. In December 2007, it was transferred from Kretschmar to Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia.
389Mr. Bhatia came on title so that they could get a cheaper interest rate and TD would not accept the mortgage unless Bhatia signed.
390Exhibit 37 is an acknowledgement and direction to Maurizio Vani, dated October 30, 2007 regarding Lee/de Cruz-Lee transfer to Lee/Bhatia. It is signed by Angela and Prem Bhatia signed it. Present in Mr. Vani’s office when this was signed was Angela, Larry and he could not remember if Prem Bhatia was there but assumes he was.
391The transferors on the transfer of 56 Ravenscliffe are de Cruz-Lee, Angela Judith and himself. The transferees are Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia. The document has the transferees initially listed as joint tenants but that is scratched out with Mr. Lee as tenant in common as 99 per cent and Prem Bhatia at 1 per cent. That change is initialed by Prem, Larry and Angela. Prem Bhatia would have 1 per cent of the title on the mortgage.
392The last page, page 11 of 11, refers to spousal consent and it is signed by Angela with Vani’s signature as witness but he is not sure of the witness signature. He recognizes Angela’s signature at page 11 of 11.
393When they returned to the house in 2007 Larry paid all the bills including mortgage, hydro and water.
394He does not remember when or what happened when his wife moved out for good. After she moved out, he lived there with Michelle de Cruz-Lee and he paid the mortgage, property taxes and all the bills.
395Tab 16 was shown to Mr. Lee which is his answer. On the last page, page 1B, he has listed:
(1) Married on May 27, 1995
(2) Separated on May 2, 1994
396His memory is not great and he cannot remember when he separated. He signed Tab 16 on January 8, 2011 at page three. Point 6 at page 2 shows the parties were married on May 27, 1985. He cannot remember if it is right saying it can’t be right.
397Tab D of Exhibit 54, the Document Brief, was shown to Mr. Lee. It is an agreement of purchase and sale of 56 Ravenscliffe with Lee and Bhatia as sellers to buyers as Nichols and Kenneth and another he cannot make out. It was supposed to close in April 2013.
39856 Ravenscliffe was put up for sale because it was getting to be too much money and Angela was playing around, so he decided to sell.
399Tab B of the Document Brief shows the house sold for $382,000.
400Tab E of the Document Brief is dated March 14, 2013 and is a letter from Kingsway Real Estate. They are the people who sold the house. Their commission was $19,100.
401Tab F of the Document Brief is acknowledgement and direction to Inderbir Arora regarding the Lee/Bhatia sale to Liburd/Nichols at 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton. Paragraph four was read into the record. It says that Angela de Cruz-Lee is unwilling to release $20,000 to Prem Bhatia and it is being held back pending litigation/settlement. The document is signed by Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee with a date of April 22, 2013.
402The $20,000 reflected the amount that Mr. Bhatia put in when TD refinanced the CIBC mortgage which had gone bad. TD knew he was on the mortgage and was on for that amount of money.
403Exhibit 34, an affidavit of Mark Trenholme, was shown to Mr. Lee and paragraph 13 was read into the record. The gist of paragraph 13 is that the purpose of obtaining each new mortgage funding replaced the existing defaulted mortgage, and not because of fraud. Mr. Lee agrees with the paragraph 13 statement.
404Exhibit 32 is a letter from Mark Trenholme addressed to Angela de Cruz-Lee, 616 Dogwood Lane, Waterloo, which is Angela’s address. Mr. Trenholme is a lawyer but not Mr. Lee’s lawyer. The gist of the first paragraph is that the July 2012 real transaction involving Bhatia/Lee was to correct a previous error and the current title is 99 per cent by Mr. Lee and 1 per cent by Mr. Bhatia. Mr. Lee agrees that Exhibit 32 is correct.
405Tab A of the Document Brief was shown to Mr. Lee. It is dated October 9, 2014 and is a trust statement prepared by Inderbir Arora, a lawyer. The note at the bottom indicates that the funds remaining from the sale of the house was $52,992.61 subject to any deduction for legal fees from Arora.
406Mr. Lee would like to use those funds for his daughter’s further education. His daughter lives with him at 123 Railway Street, Brampton and his relationship with his daughter is good but she has a tendency to run things. If he does something bad, he hears about it.
Cross-Examination By Ms. de Cruz-Lee
407He was involved in the mining business because the applicant got him involved in it. She compelled him to get into it.
408Ed Blanchard from Erana Mines got them involved. Two of his friends told him Ed was after Angela and not the mining business.
409He is saying that Angela compelled him to get into the mining business because she wanted to get into the mining business.
410Mr. Lee never received any monies from the work that Angela did in the mining business. He received nothing but lost a lot.
411Ms. de Cruz-Lee reminded him he was under oath.
412He remembers Wendy Elash. He cannot remember meeting or receiving a cheque from her.
413Exhibit 4B – Agreement of Purchase and Sale was shown to Mr. Lee; it has Bigelow and Larry Lee as purchasers. It refers to the mine property for Vansickle made in Brampton on November 7, 2003. The seller is seller agent/owner Angela de Cruz-Lee for Dr. Ulrich Kretschmar.
414Ms. de Cruz-Lee read a large portion into the record. The gist of what she read in indicates that Larry Lee and Verdun Bigelow agree to purchase the mining property for $500,000. Verdun Bigelow is to pay his $250,000 first from a loan on his home in Cobalt. Larry Lee is to pay his $250,000 later when the company is in full production and making sales. There is a further agreement made at lawyers Prouse, Dash and Crouch that:
(1) Verdun Bigelow is to pay off the mortgage currently owing by the Lees on 56 Ravenscliffe.
(2) Verdun Bigelow owes Angela de Cruz-Lee $38,000 consulting fees for six months.
(3) Verdun Bigelow is to take out a loan on his home in Cobalt to purchase the mine before January 15, 2004.
(4) Verdun Bigelow will not hold Larry Lee or Angela liable for any loans he obtains.
(5) Verdun Bigelow is not to use any documents signed at the Prouse, Dash and Crouch law firm on November 7, 2003 as those documents are in error and are to be destroyed.
(6) There was a 30 day cooling off period.
415Larry Lee concedes that Exhibit 4B is well written and he had a part in the final edit.
416Mr. Lee indicated, “Well the big trick there was I had you standing behind me, kicking. You wanted to get in the mining business. …I was making enough money to pay the mortgage and everything else.” Mr. Lee indicated, “You wanted to get into this, so we got into it.”
417Mr. Lee signed the document; “Yes we had to.” The document indicates that all costs and losses for cancelling the agreement will be borne by the cancelling party.
418Mr. Lee had never heard of Mr. Bigelow before until all of a sudden she wanted to get into the mining business.
419Mr. Bigelow put up something too and he lost.
420Exhibit 14 contains a picture of a Power of Attorney document. Mr. Lee indicated he did not remember it. Larry Lee recognizes his signature and Angela’s signature. He does not recognize Darryl Sittler’s signature.
421The Power of Attorney document was read into the record by Ms. de Cruz-Lee. The gist of it appoints Mr. Lee to act for Donnie Verdun Bigelow to do all things Bigelow is legally entitled, as of January 5, 2006. Further, it states that IF the CIBC Bank and President’s Choice or their legal representative can find a legal way to put Verdun Bigelow and Verdun Nelson Bigelow together as one man, Mr. Lee is enforcing the agreement to transfer the loan as agreed to by Mr. Bigelow in the Exhibit 4B mining agreement to transfer the CIBC mortgage on 56 Ravenscliffe to Verdun Bigelow’s property in Cobalt.
422Exhibit 42 shows that on January 6, 2006, a day after the Power of Attorney, with respect to 56 Ravenscliffe, the home is transferred from Verdun Bigelow to Larry Lee and Angela Judith De Cruz-Lee. The CIBC mortgage stayed on.
423Mr. Lee agreed that he held Power of Attorney over Verdun Bigelow.
424Mr. Lee agreed that he had the ability to transfer all the bills on the house to Bigelow as per the purchase and sales agreement.
425Mr. Lee does not know why it was not carried through.
426Mr. Lee did not understand how Ms. de Cruz-Lee came to the conclusion that there would be no mortgage or bills on the house.
427Mr. Lee does not know if CIBC found a legal way to put Bigelow and Bigelow together as one man. Mr. Lee did not think Bigelow used two names but the document says two in there.
428Ms. de Cruz-Lee struggled with how to take Mr. Lee through the Exhibit 2 affidavit and so I did it for her. She wanted to refer to paragraph 9.
429Exhibit 2 is an affidavit of Mr. Lee, dated November 16, 2007. He recognizes his signature on the document.
430At paragraph 9, it states that on or about November 14, 2003, Verdun Bigelow also known as Verdun Nelson Bigelow attended at David Dash’s office and fraudulently affected a transfer from Mr. Lee and Angela in favour of himself. A true copy of the transfer was attached as Exhibit 6. Mr. Lee said the paragraph 9 statement is true.
431I then turned the cross-examination over to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. Ms. de Cruz-Lee then announced, “Your Honour, my exhibits were taken. I don’t know where they are. I’m working on a skeleton exhibit. Right now, I’m trying to reconstruct it.”
432I asked her if that meant she did not know where paragraph 9 was herself. She indicated she just had part of the paper.
433Mr. Lee thinks the bank was trying to straighten out the two names later.
434I indicated to Ms. de Cruz-Lee that I had trouble seeing how this evidence assisted her. Even if there was a fraud (and I was not satisfied there was one) by the mining people on Larry and her, that would not change their respective ownership of what was left. Ms. de Cruz-Lee struggled with understanding this point.
435In Exhibit 2, at paragraph 3, Mr. Lee indicates that he has been the beneficial owner of the property along with his wife Angela de Cruz-Lee since December 11, 1996.
436Exhibit 42 was shown to Mr. Lee. By this time, it was apparent that Mr. Lee struggled with reading the documents and was easily confused in going to the appropriate areas.
437At this point, I indicated that with Mr. Lee’s age and mental elements, he seemed to have a hard time comprehending what was going on. He immediately then found an appropriate paragraph of Exhibit 42.
438Accordingly, eventually Mr. Lee got to the portion of Exhibit 42 that showed a transfer in 1996 to Angela Judith de Cruz-Lee. Mr. Lee repeated again that he put it in her name to cover for the child and everything else in case anything happened to him.
439In 2001, the house was transferred to both of them. Mr. Lee did not know why that was done.
440Mr. Lee indicated he put down the down payment in 1996. He said he had proof of the payment but did not have it here. He did not know if he had it or not. He would have to check. The matter was put over for further cross-examination.
Cross-Examination Continuing – February 11, 2015
441I indicated to Mr. Lee that his ex-wife is alleging a fraud and in Exhibit 2 Mr. Lee said there was a fraud. I was struggling being able to figure out who was defrauding who and how it was done. I asked him how did this fraud take place?
442He testified he did not know.
443Mr. Lee indicated that the CIBC mortgage was done to clear the house of any liens. “We paid everything off.” The liens consisted of first and second mortgages to Home Trust and Punjab loans.
444Mr. Lee testified that CIBC was not part of any fraud; they just took over the mortgage.
445Mr. Lee agreed with Ms. de Cruz-Lee that way back to 1996 they lived in the same house but not as husband and wife. There was no official separation date.
446With respect to bringing men to the house, the police had to remove her and one guy she was in bed with; Mr. Lee said he would have to get the date from Child Services but could not give a rough date.
447Mr. Lee said that he would go along with a separation date of 1996.
448Mr. Lee said that when the police, it was Mr. Mitchell who was in bed with her which was one door down the hallway from her daughter’s bedroom. Mr. Lee indicated Mr. Mitchell was a young fellow from Caledon. The police did not remove Mr. Mitchell; they got him out and the same for her.
449There were pictures on Angela’s computer that were put in Michelle’s computer. One showed Ms. de Cruz-Lee having sex from behind with this guy and the other one showed her down on her knees in front of him and he was taking a picture looking down. Mr. Lee saw them, the one of them on Michelle’s computer and he told her to erase them.
450Mr. Lee did not have the date, time or occurrence number of the police report.
451Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked a number of questions about the plans and design of the house but he could not remember the details.
452They both slept together in the master bedroom upstairs for a certain length of time but after, they did not.
453Mr. Lee could not produce the Mitchell photos because they were on Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s computer and somehow Ms. de Cruz-Lee put it on her daughter’s computer.
454In 2010, prior to her May 3 surgery, Ms. de Cruz-Lee slept in the master bedroom. After her surgery on May 3, 2010, Mr. Lee did not let Ms. de Cruz-Lee into the house because Michelle did not want to see her anymore.
455Mr. Lee referred to an incident where Ms. De Cruz-Lee took out a special mattress and wiped blood all over the top of it.
456Mr. Lee cannot remember putting Ms. de Cruz-Lee out of the house after her surgery. Mr. Lee knows Ms. de Cruz-Lee was put out of the house because of the Mitchell incident. His son was a personal friend of Michelle’s and Michelle never forgave that.
457There were other men but he does not know who they were and he could not care less.
458Mr. Lee did not cover up for Michelle; she is a good daughter; “Why would I cover up for her”.
459Mr. Lee could not remember texts where Michelle was away for two days.
460Mr. Lee did not buy alcohol for Michelle; “If your daughter had a drink, it was because she had a mother like you”.
461Michelle had to go to school and live down Ms. de Cruz-Lee going to parents’ meetings jerking her skirt right up to her crotch and “then laughing at the little boys looking at you”.
462I again pointed out that again Ms. de Cruz-Lee was asking questions she did not know the answers to and getting answers I did not think were going to help her.
463At some point Mr. Lee started to sleep in the spare bedroom downstairs.
464Mr. Lee did not have another residence at 490 Latour Crescent.
465Ms. de Cruz-Lee suggested that they were separated in 1989 when he was arrested by five police officers at J.C. Marks and those officers had to save her life. Mr. Lee indicated he does not remember being arrested or J.C. Marks.
466She suggested he has a scar on his nose from the incident. Mr. Lee says the scar is from his glasses.
467Mr. Lee indicated he did not remember killing her in front of a number of witnesses and police officers and being photographed and fingerprinted.
468Ms. de Cruz-Lee has no copy of a criminal record. Mr. Lee testified he has no criminal record.
469Mr. Lee says the date of separation is 1996 but cannot give details because he has a bad memory and that is going back a long way.
470Ms. de Cruz-Lee returned to asking questions about the CIBC mortgage.
471Mr. Lee indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee had an urge to go into the mining business; Verdun Bigelow got involved. All their furniture and everything went to Bigelow’s place.
472CIBC was there to cover whatever they owed on the house because TD would not cover it; nobody. So they went to CIBC and Verdun Bigelow helped with that mortgage and ultimately they had to remortgage later with Prem [Bhatia].
473Ms. de Cruz-Lee then returned to Exhibit 4B which had been gone over the previous day.
474Exhibit 42 shows the CIBC mortgage was put on January 6, 2004.
475The date of cancellation for the 30 day cooling period in Exhibit 4B would be December 7, 2003.
476Mr. Lee testified that Mr. Bigelow was never a partner of his, she wanted to get into the mining business.
477On December 7, 2003, Exhibit 4B was binding and Bigelow was to pay off the mortgage on 56 Ravenscliffe. Bigelow did not pay off the mortgage. Mr. Lee does not know how that happened.
478Mr. Lee was referred to Exhibit 15. He indicated he just got out of the hospital and was in terrible shape and was having trouble dealing with all of this.
479Exhibit 15 was signed by Mr. Lee as attorney for Mr. Bigelow on December 31, 2003. Mr. Lee acted as power of attorney for Verdun Bigelow and put a CIBC mortgage on the house to keep the house. Mr. Lee indicated, “Power of Attorney, I don’t think so.” This was in reference to Mr. Bigelow.
480Exhibit 15 is an acknowledgement and direction, dated December 31, 2003 as power of attorney for Bigelow putting a CIBC mortgage of $238,500 on the property.
481Mr. Lee had a number of documents in front of him. I noted that when multiple documents are in front of him he gets lost in the sea of them.
482Once they were all cleared away, Exhibit 15 was put in front of Mr. Lee and he indicated he arranged the CIBC mortgage to clear up bills and a lot of things. “We couldn’t get a mortgage, as Verdun helped up to get a mortgage on CIBC”.
483Mr. Lee said he did the CIBC mortgage to cover other mortgages and mining business and whatever else was on it.
484There were debts for the mining business and anything that was owing was put on the CIBC mortgage.
485Ms. de Cruz-Lee advised that she wanted to put the photograph of the power of attorney direction January 5 to the witness but she has misplaced the number and needed time to look for it.
486Mr. Lee agreed that in Exhibit 2 he indicated that what was owing on the mortgage was $217,000. The new one was $238,000. The $21,000 difference was owing for mining business debts or whatever else.
487CIBC was the only place they could get a mortgage.
488Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked for Exhibit 4B as the photo of power of attorney but Ms. Murthi assisted her indicating it was Exhibit 14.
489Ms. de Cruz-Lee again read Exhibit 14 into the record, which was dated January 5, 2006. Mr. Lee indicated he understood it. The power of attorney was not to transfer everything back to Bigelow. It was so that Mr. Lee had control so he could not take it.
490Exhibit 42 shows that on January 6, 2006 the house was transferred from Bigelow to Larry Lee and Angela de Cruz-Lee because Verdun Bigelow wanted to take everything.
491In July 2005, Richard Prouse suggested there was a fraud and to move Bigelow quickly off title.
492Exhibit 13 is a revocation of living trust. It is signed by Angela and Mr. Lee. They both signed together.
493Mr. Lee has no idea why Mr. Bigelow was made their trustee. The document alleges that Mr. Bigelow created fraud on the Lees home to benefit himself. Point 7 indicates Mr. Bigelow was fired because he committed fraud.
494Mr. Lee agreed with the suggestion that the fraud was to put a mortgage on 56 Ravenscliffe when he signed the purchase and sales agreement to pay off the mortgage and put a mortgage on Bigelow’s own home.
495Exhibit 42 shows that on November 14, 2003 there was a transfer from the Lees to Bigelow. Mr. Lee could not remember how that happened.
496Exhibit 4 indicates at point 5 that Bigelow was not to use any documents dated November 7, 2003 signed by the Lees. Seven days later there was a transfer in Exhibit 42 from the Lees to Bigelow.
497Mr. Lee does not remember how Mr. Bigelow took title to the house.
498Exhibit 21 was shown to Mr. Lee. It is an email from TD Bank to Mr. Bhatia enquiring if Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s name is on title.
499Mr. Lee indicated that CIBC was foreclosing probably because they could not make the payments or Verdun Bigelow was on it. The foreclosure was a surprise to Mr. Lee. He knew the foreclosure was coming but not the date. He knew they were in trouble. Mr. Lee does not remember if Ms. de Cruz-Lee was served with the foreclosure papers. He remembers at some point in time getting served.
500He remembers roughly on July 5, 2007 being locked out of the house but he did not remember the exact date; he knows it was July.
501Exhibit 42 shows a transfer from Kretschmar to the Lees on July 5, 2007.
502Mr. Lee agreed that Kretschmar was taken off title because he was committing fraud but then indicated he was getting Kretschmar mixed up with Bigelow.
503Mr. Lee agreed with the suggestion that Kretschmar was put on title by fraud. However he indicated that Verdun Bigelow was trying to get the house; he is not sure of Kretschmar.
504Mr. Lee remembers going to Peterborough to meet Mr. Kretschmar but did not go to Kretschmar’s house.
505It was suggested that Kretschmar was extorting $80,000 before he would transfer title back. Mr. Lee indicated Kretschmar was not extorting him and was not aware of any extortion for $80,000.
506Mr. Lee was aware that Kretschmar was taken off title.
507On December 20, 2007 it was Mr. Lee and Prem dealing with TD to put the mortgage on.
508Prem Bhatia got the TD mortgage for $20,000. Mr. Lee could not remember why she was taken off title.
509Mr. Lee thinks that with the CIBC mortgage and the house worth $400,000, the equity might have been $150,000 to $170,000.
510Angela went off title because she had no income and Prem Bhatia had covered the top end of the mortgage - $20,000 – so they could get the TD mortgage.
511Prem Bhatia and Mr. Lee were put on the mortgage; Prem was on for a very small amount and he was on for the balance.
512Mr. Lee is aware that a person can have no income and can sign a mortgage but the co-signor better be well off especially if you are talking a mortgage that size.
513Ms. de Cruz-Lee could not get on title because with the TD mortgage, she had no income and Prem Bhatia signed on.
514Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not get anything for deleting her name off the title.
515Mr. Lee did not look for any receipts for the down payment. He would not find anything. He told people that since 1996 he was the only person paying for the house.
516Exhibit 26 was shown to Mr. Lee. It is an affidavit of Mr. Lee for a motion brought on November 2, 2010. In the affidavit, Mr. Lee says only himself is on title on the property in November 2010.
517Exhibit 42 shows Mr. Bhatia to be on title as well in November 2010.
518Exhibit 26 is only a partial affidavit filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee with no signature. The continuing record was searched and the original was located at Tab 7 of the continuing record which is an affidavit dated November 3, 2010.
519Mr. Lee recognizes the signatures as Matt Stone and himself.
520Matt Stone is a lawyer who Ms. de Cruz-Lee knows very well. He was duty counsel.
521The first time “we” met Matt Stone was in university – York University. Matt Stone was taking a law degree along with Rob Christie. It was prior to 1994, when Michelle was born.
522Matt Stone was in the hospital when Ms. de Cruz-Lee gave birth to Michelle.
523The November 3 affidavit was filed for a November 9 motion where Justice Ricchetti gave Mr. Lee exclusive possession of the matrimonial home and to have Michelle with him. The order is Tab 1 of the Trial Record.
524Mr. Lee does not remember Ms. de Cruz-Lee phoning and saying she needed to see Michelle because she could die in surgery.
525Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to ask questions on the November 3 affidavit but her copy did not have paragraph numbers on it or page numbers.
526The affidavit indicates that the applicant has serious mental problems that interfere with her ability to interact with the child and places the child at risk. Mr. Lee said that is true.
527Mr. Lee testified it is true that Ms. de Cruz-Lee has anger management problems, has attempted to injure him on numerous occasions and has not admitted to psychological issues regarding her sexual activity.
528Ms. de Cruz-Lee started to ask about alcohol and drug abuse and objected to it being there in the affidavit.
529I indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee opened the door by asking about alcohol and drug abuse and that she is not learning and that I doubted it was going to be good for her.
530Mr. Lee indicated that her daughter had stated her mother was involved with marijuana having been introduced to it by various boyfriends. Her daughter also indicated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee had been drinking more heavily.
531Mr. Lee was asked about parental alienation. Mr. Lee stated that Ms. de Cruz-Lee has problems but she will never admit it.
532Mr. Lee is not able to say when in 1996 they were separated, whether it is January, February or whatever month.
533Ms. de Cruz-Lee tried to submit more documents. One was ruled inadmissible as hearsay, and she could not find the other but had to look for it. I reminded Ms. de Cruz-Lee that we were in the seventh day of supposed two day trial and asked her to continue her cross-examination.
534Tab 7 of the continuing record, the original of Exhibit 26 which Ms. de Cruz-Lee submitted was put in as Exhibit 60. Ms. de Cruz-Lee objected to it going in but I reminded her that she had brought it up and asked Mr. Lee if the contents were true and he had said yes. Mr. Lee confirmed that everything in the affidavit was true and Matt Stone helped him.
535Exhibit 27, an excerpt of Mr. Lee’s financial form, was shown to him. In 2011, his lawyer was Rochelle Greene.
536The excerpt was a poor copy and I looked for the original in the continuing record.
537Ms. Murthi indicated that Tab 18 of the continuing record is the original of Exhibit 27. It was made Exhibit 61.
538Ms. de Cruz-Lee apologized because all her exhibits were lost so she had to reconstruct it all last night and she was going crazy.
539At page 7 of Exhibit 61 there are a number of debts listed as of January 2011. Mr. Lee is asked what the $20,000 debt for Rob Christie is. They have known Rob Christie ever since she was in university.
540Mr. Lee indicated he did not know and would have to ask Mr. Christie. Ms. de Cruz-Lee advised she was looking for an email from Rob Christie but she does not know where it went. The registrar advised it had not been filed as an exhibit. It was after some time located by the registrar as Exhibit AA, filed as a lettered exhibit due to the possibility of solicitor-client privilege.
541Mr. Lee could not remember Mr. Christie. I allowed Exhibit AA to be entered as Exhibit 62. It is an email dated November 9, 2010 asking if a document, saying that his house is not a matrimonial home, would stand up in court. The email date is November 9, 2010; Nov. 3, 2010 is the date that is on Exhibit 60. There was no response to the email. Had there been a response, I would probably have ruled it as a solicitor-client conversation and the question itself had little probative value.
542In his November 3, 2010 affidavit, Larry Lee was assuming that 56 Ravenscliffe was a matrimonial home.
543Rob Christie is Michelle’s godfather.
544Exhibit 37 was once again shown to Mr. Lee. The date of Exhibit 37 is October 30, 2007. The address for service is 56 Ravenscliffe Court, Brampton.
545Mr. Lee confirmed that on October 30, 2007 they were living at the Howard Johnson.
546Ms. de Cruz-Lee asked, once again, about the signature on Exhibit 37. At page 4, Mr. Lee recognized the signature as belonging to her, him and Prem. The document was prepared on October 30, 2007. Mr. Lee could not remember if the changes on the document were there when he signed it.
547In Exhibit 37, it says Ms. de Cruz-Lee consented and he is asked if she consented in 2012. Mr. Lee is saying he does not know if she did or did not but that’s what he is saying.
548At page 4 of Exhibit 37, Mr. Lee did not sign her signature.
549Ms. de Cruz-Lee started asking questions about 2012 with reference to Exhibit 37 but it was signed in October 2007.
550It was pointed out that Exhibit 32 relates to what happened in 2012. This is the letter from Mark Trenholme that a transaction was done in July 2012 to correct a mistake.
551Ms. de Cruz-Lee referred to page 3 of Exhibit 32 but Exhibit 32 has only 2 pages. The third page Ms. de Cruz-Lee has was in fact entered as Exhibit 56.
552Ms. de Cruz-Lee then wanted to ask more questions regarding page 4 of Exhibit 37 which had already been gone over repeatedly and she seemed to abandon asking about Exhibit 56.
553Mr. Lee was asked if he remembered if Ms. de Cruz-Lee was there on October 3, 2007. Mr. Lee could not remember.
554Ms. de Cruz-Lee then stated on July 17, 2012, she was not even in Toronto and that signature is not hers.
555Ms. de Cruz-Lee then went back yet again to page 6 of Exhibit 37 where no signatures appear.
556Mr. Lee indicated that there was an intent to put a TD mortgage on 56 Ravenscliffe back in 2007 because “we” could get a better interest rate and everything else.
557Ms. de Cruz-Lee put Exhibit 3 to Mr. Lee. He remembers putting Exhibit 3 together. It was for the mortgage fraud in January, 2004. Mr. Lee did not remember about the mortgage fraud; they suffered a mortgage loss.
558Exhibit 57 is a request for taxpayer relief. Mr. Lee asks for tax relief from the CRA due to mortgage fraud on their home, family environmental sensitivity and medical costs. The date on the document is August 18, 2008.
559Mr. Lee read from part of the document indicating that he is waiting for Mr. Vani to clear up the title as part of the mortgage fraud.
560In 2008, Mr. Lee had 99 per cent ownership and Mr. Bhatia had 1 per cent.
561Ms. de Cruz-Lee raised her voice and started to yell at Mr. Lee regarding who is the rightful beneficial owner. Mr. Lee stated that, “I should have been on title, wouldn’t you say.”
562Ms. de Cruz-Lee returned yet again to Exhibit 37. Page 5 indicates a total consideration of $152,500. Mr. Lee could not figure it out.
563Exhibit 45, dated February 2010, is a document purportedly signed by Mr. Lee but he is not sure. Mr. Lee was not providing any information to ODSP regarding her application. Mr. Lee was not aware of her two surgeries.
564Ms. de Cruz-Lee again returned to Exhibit 37. Mr. Lee says it is true that Ms. de Cruz-Lee is his spouse and has consented to the transaction.
565Ms. de Cruz-Lee was going over the same points time and again. I expressed the concern that little effort has been made to expedite this trial and we were now into our eighth day for a $50,000 claim and that we were now into legal fees of in excess of over $50,000 and that legal fees were going to eat up a good portion of the equity.
566Ms. de Cruz-Lee made a remark that her last lawyer, Mark Trenholme knew about the fraud and did not even do anything.
567I indicated that was not even close. Mr. Trenholme in Exhibit 34 looked into it and told Ms. de Cruz-Lee that there was no mortgage and title fraud and her position had no merit. But Ms. de Cruz-Lee chose to ignore it.
Re-Examination
568He couldn’t remember when he moved into another bedroom – it was too much time. Michelle was 12-14 when Ms. De Cruz-Lee started to bring men into the house. He at that time was living in another room.
569In Exhibit 60, he stated they separated in February 2010. Mr. Lee said, its close, he does not have a good memory.
570He and Ms. de Cruz-Lee were both involved in the mining business but he dropped out of it very quickly. They were not really husband and wife at that time.
Reply By Ms. de Cruz-Lee
571Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to file a letter regarding Mr. Lee’s insurance claim that he was seeking disability benefits for a psychotic illness of disabling proportions. I ruled that this document should have been tendered earlier but not in reply. Further, the letter was from Steven Gray and was hearsay. It was relevant during cross-examination but was not put to Mr. Lee. I ruled it inadmissible.
572Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to file an information seeking a psychiatric examination of Mr. Lee pursuant to the Mental Health Act. The document was never served on opposing counsel in violation of the rules. This had been pointed out to Ms. de Cruz-Lee many times.
573The bulk of the document was hearsay except for a couple of emails from Mr. Lee which could have been put to him in cross-examination but was not. The document was ruled inadmissible.
574Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to file her complaint to the police regarding the 1989 incident and their response. It was hearsay. It was not served on the other party. It had no probative value. It was ruled inadmissible.
575Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to file further hearsay documents and this request was denied
576One of the emails, that were denied, was from Bruce Castleman. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was given the opportunity to have him testify by way of skype.
577Ms. de Cruz-Lee wanted to file her letter written to CRA but that was denied for obvious reasons.
578Ms. de Cruz-Lee then attempted to file an email from Mr. Lee to Mr. Stone that has been on her computer since October 28, 2010. I allowed it as Exhibit 62 because Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she did not print it out until the day before due to inadvertence.
579Ms. de Cruz-Lee took the stand and indicated in 1996 she chose the house along with carpet colour, everything. She chose the house because it had four large bedrooms. It had space for her daughter, places for her music and dance as well as an office and spare bedroom for visitors. The master bedroom was her bedroom and she slept with her daughter at the time.
580Mr. Lee had another place and he would go there whenever he wanted to. Mr. Lee slept in the spare bedroom. He was there because he had no place to go after their separation in 1989 after the police beating. He agreed to give everything due to a separated spouse.
581Mr. Lee became like part of the furniture. He would fall asleep on the couch. At his age, he could sit in the chair and fall asleep.
582She was not sleeping with Mr. Lee in the same room because he suffered impotency in the 1999 beating with the police officers.
583They slept in separate beds at Howard Johnson hotel in 2007 when they were forced out of the house. He also slept in the car one night and when they slept briefly at the neighbours, Mr. Lee slept in another room.
584When they returned in December 2007, they got two couches. She slept in the master bedroom and Mr. Lee slept in the other bedroom.
585Mr. Lee would often sleep with Michelle and he would not allow her to stop it. He would pull out the couch and block the door.
586She and Mr. Lee never shared the same bed. After her surgery, Mr. Lee would not let her in the house and she moved to the Waterloo address at 616 Dogwood Lane.
Cross-Examination
587Ms. de Cruz-Lee says they were separated in 1989 and there was a separation agreement. She has no copy of it. She does not have any belongings, let alone her passport. The document was on the safety box with the stocks and valuables and they were taken out of the house. They never slept together in 1996 when the home was purchased.
588Ms. de Cruz-Lee was not ready to deal with the skype matter and it was not heard.
589I allowed Ms. de Cruz-Lee to testify about the Mitchell matter which the respondent had brought up although through cross-examination by Ms. De Cruz-Lee.
Further Reply Evidence
590Tyler Mitchell came to the house distraught. He was allowed to stay there and the school contacted her. They wanted her to sign as guardian.
591His father came over, she did not want to sign as guardian.
592She would not allow Michelle to visit Caledon. Larry said that the father would look after Michelle as his daughter since they looked after their son. Michelle did go to Caledon with the father and Tyler.
593The grandparents have a large estate and she has been there to visit them as they are nice and she is comfortable with them.
594On the day Tyler moved out, he was preventing Mr. Lee from hitting her.
Cross-Examination
595In response to whether there was a sexual relationship, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stated after Mr. Mitchell was protecting her, he found out she was single and he realized that.
596She was asked again, yes or no, was there a sexual relationship. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was again evasive stating, “He was basically like a friend to me, yes”.
597She was asked again if she had a sexual relationship. The answer was again evasive: “At what time and what date.”
598Eventually Ms. De Cruz-Lee denied any relationship: “No he came to visit his son.”
Analysis of Witness’ Evidence
599There are four major witnesses in this case. Two called by the applicant – Pradeep Bhatia and Angela de Cruz-Lee; and two called by the respondent – Michelle Lee and Larry Lee.
Pradeep Bhatia
600His evidence is relevant to two issues:
(1) The date of separation.
(2) Ownership of 56 Ravenscliffe.
Date of Separation
601In 2003, Mr. Bhatia met Ms. de Cruz-Lee while walking his dog. She introduced Larry Lee to him, as her husband. In 2003, he found the couple Angela and Larry and their daughter to be wonderful, fantastic people. Larry and Angela were a wonderful couple. The relationship between the parents and daughter seemed perfect. They did not ask for help from 2003-2007.
602When the Lee’s were removed from their home, he helped to re-finance the home. Larry, at one point, got into an argument with one of the proposed financiers and threatened to beat him up. In 2003, the Lee’s seemed very happy. In 2007, they seemed like a couple. He did not realize they were separated until these proceedings started.
603This evidence is in direct conflict with the evidence of the Lee family. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says they were separated since 1989 when Mr. Lee tried to kill her. Her submission was that she was human trafficked, abused and Mr. Lee was a “monster”. Mr. Lee testified that the separation was as far back as 1996. There were no sexual relations since Michelle’s birth. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had many boyfriends and outside sexual relations. Men were coming in and out of the house. Michelle Lee described her mother as abusive and controlling. Her mother was a “shitty mother”. Michelle gave details about affairs with other men including her best friend’s father and Mr. Bigelow and Mr. Kretschmar, the mining associates. Michelle indicated her father was submissive to Ms. de Cruz-Lee. Michelle’s hatred of her mother was palpable on the witness stand.
604I accept that, regardless of who was telling the truth, the Lee marriage was toxic and poisonous. There is and was nothing normal about it. For Mr. Bhatia to be intimately involved with this family for many years and to be totally oblivious to this toxicity and hatred defies belief. I do not find him to be a credible witness regarding the relationships in the Lee family.
Ownership of 56 Ravenscliffe
605After the Lees were removed from their home, Mr. Bhatia assisted the Lees to recover their home. Mr. Bhatia’s father retained a Mr. Mand and paid a $5,000 retainer. Angela de Cruz-Lee and Larry Lee signed a promissory note to pay the $5,000 back but it was never repaid. In December 2007, Mr. Bhatia received an urgent call that if $7,800 was not paid back that day, the house was lost. Mr. Bhatia loaned Mr. Lee the money and immediately obtained a bank draft for $7,800 payable to Mr. Vani, Larry Lee’s lawyer. The family owed Mr. Bhatia $12,800 at this point.
606In addition to the $12,800, Mr. Bhatia loaned mainly Larry but also Angela additional monies so that $20,000 is now owed by the Lee’s to Mr. Bhatia. Tab F of the Document Brief, Exhibit 54, dated April 22, 2013 indicates that Prem Bhatia is owed $20,000 and was to receive $20,000 from the house sale proceeds but was not paid out due to Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s objections. The stress of all the motions and proceedings contributed to senior Mr. Bhatia’s death.
607The senior Mr. Bhatia, Prem Bhatia, had good credit and he arranged for a TD mortgage of $305,000 to be put on the home. Tab C of Exhibit 54 confirms that on December 20, 2007 a $305,000 TD charge was put on the home with Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee as mortgagors. The CIBC mortgage was paid off. Mr. Bhatia and Mr. Lee were put on title. Mr. Prem Bhatia did not want to go on title but the TD mortgage person at TD Bank told him he needed to be on one per cent in order to get the mortgage; otherwise the mortgage could not be arranged.
608Regarding the 2007 refinancing, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was in the meetings with the lawyer and mortgage broker. She was not present in meetings with the TD Bank.
609From 2007 onwards, Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia had a joint account because of the mortgage. Larry was responsible for the payments but towards the end of 2012, payments were not being made on time, taxes were not being paid and the mortgage was going into default. TD Bank was threatening power of sale proceedings. If the power of sale went through, the proceeds could be less than the mortgage. Mr. Trenholme, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s lawyer, brought a motion to sell the house on April 26, 2013. Pradeep Bhatia was there. Tab 7 of the trial record confirms that the motion was granted by Justice Price and in the presence of Larry Lee, Mark Trenholme, solicitor for Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Prem Bhatia. The house was sold with a closing date for the end of April 2013. Pradeep Bhatia believed Angela had okayed this because “this is her lawyer”. Later, Angela was very, very upset that the house had been taken from her. She was upset, crying as this house was her life because of her illness and she bought it for that purpose.
610Mr. Bhatia was aware that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was working on mining deals and had an outside promotional business but she was not working as such at a job. He was aware that in 2003, Larry and Ms. de Cruz-Lee were working on some mining deal involving calcium carbonate with a potential of making half a million dollars. On November 24, 2003 Verdun Bigelow was put on title at 56 Ravenscliffe. On January 6, 2004 a charge in the name of Verdun Bigelow was deleted and was replaced by a CIBC mortgage – see Tab C of the document brief.
611I accept this part of Mr. Bhatia’s evidence (dealing with the refinancing of 56 Ravenscliffe and subsequent financial transactions with respect to that property) as the bulk of it is supported by the exhibits and documentary evidence filed at this trial.
Angela de Cruz-Lee
612Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified on her own behalf and introduced numerous exhibits, virtually all of which had not been provided to the respondent in advance. Given her status as a non-represented party, I allowed the exhibits to be introduced into evidence despite the flagrant disregard of the rules of practice. More disconcerting was the fact that, despite my repeatedly telling Ms. de Cruz-Lee she had to at least provide a copy of her proposed exhibits to the respondent in advance of tendering the exhibit, she basically ignored this admonition and continued to introduce exhibits despite the total lack of advance notice to the respondent in accordance with the rules.
613With regard to assessing Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s credibility, I have considered the following evidence:
The Immaculate Conception
614Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she was in university at the time of her daughter Michelle Lee’s conception and had no sexual relations with Mr. Lee or anyone at all.
615At p. 31 of the December 4 transcript, she testified that she went to York University from September 1992 until her graduation in June 1995. She testified that from September 1992 until the child was born, she had no sexual relationship with anyone and accordingly had no sexual relationships at the time her daughter was conceived. She does not know how she got pregnant. She is out of luck as to who the father is.
616She filed as Exhibit 10 a prescription for Lorazepam made out to Mr. Lee dated August 1, 2001 which is almost 7 years after Michelle Lee’s date of birth on September 11, 1994. She claims that Lorazepam is a date rape drug. Ms. de Cruz-Lee believes that she was drugged and stated, “I believe Mr. Lee has used that drug to do whatever he could with his friends or anybody and that is why he is so sure that I would have male relationships with other people.” She agreed, at p. 34-35 of the December 4 transcript, that Larry drugged her and allowed other people to rape her. As further proof, of these rapes, all she could come up with was an email filed as Exhibit 11 wherein Larry emails Mick Crossley on August 8, 2011 stating, “Hey Mike…It’s Larry, Helen said you were on. Got a question. Larry.” This email was tendered to show how Mr. Lee communicates with them and “the Mick person has been calling me and harassing me on the phone, calling at twelve o’clock asking me to go out and I don’t even know him.” She indicated that the Helen in the email is very hostile and is a neighbour that Mr. Lee has a sexual relationship with. Helen was the lady who screamed at her when she went to 556 Ravenscliffe with Douglas Wilker and Helmut Gumz.
617I completely reject the “immaculate conception” evidence of Ms. de Cruz-Lee as being totally ridiculous and preposterous.
618Further to base a belief of conspiracy, to brutalize and rape Ms. de Cruz-Lee repeatedly, based on a 2001 prescription and an innocuous 2011 email is almost as equally ridiculous and preposterous. I find that it is also outrageous to make such a serious allegation based on this, the most flimsiest evidence imaginable. I reject Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s contention that Ms. de Cruz Lee’s sexual activities occurred as a result of a conspiracy to conduct a mass rape campaign organized by Mr. Lee.
The $20,000 Loan from Pradeep Bhatia
619At page 52 of the November 18 transcript, Mr. Bhatia, in response to questions asked by Mr. Lee, testified that his father paid $5,000 on behalf of Larry Lee and Angela De Cruz-Lee to Mr. Paul Mand. Mr. Lee and Ms. De CruzLee signed a promissory note for $5,000. He still has the original.
620At p. 84-85 of the November 18 transcript, Mr. Bhatia indicated that the Lees owed $20,000 in total to the Bhatias. Tab F of Exhibit 54 dated April 22, 2013 indicates that $20,000 is owing to Prem Bhatia but counsel for Ms. de Cruz-Lee is unwilling to release the $20,000 to Mr. Bhatia.
621At the same p. 84-85, Mr. Bhatia in response to questions asked by Ms. de Cruz-Lee in-chief, indicates that, in addition to the $5,000 promissory note, he directly loaned to Ms. de Cruz-Lee $525 for travel agent registration fees plus $600 for monthly agency fees for her and her sister – “so that’s $1,100 right there” – plus a dollar store purchase of $15, $82 for clothing for “Baybe”, $180 for school uniforms, “like it’s maybe $1500 on top of – that’s about it.”.
622In cross-examination, Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified at p. 7-8 of the February 9 transcript:
Q. Ms. de Cruz, did you borrow money from Mr. Bhatia?
A. I didn’t borrow money from Mr. Bhatia. And Mr. Bhatia will tell you that.
Q. Mr. Bhatia did tell us that you did borrow money when you – during his testimony, he said that you borrowed some money for Michelle’s schooling, used it to pay for some of her uniforms, that you had borrowed money from Mr. Bhatia?
A. That wasn’t with me. He spoke to Larry Lee, and Mr. Lee is the one that told him.
Q. That’s not what Mr. Bhatia said during his testimony. Are you saying Mr. Bhatia was incorrect?
A. Yes, I am saying incorrect.
Q. Okay. So there was money borrowed from Mr. Bhatia to pay some household expenses, would you say that’s correct?
A. I believe Mr. Bhatia was with Larry and my daughter, and I guess at that time, they make a, they made a decision to buy the, the uniform. Yes, there was money borrowed. And I…
Q. So there is money borrowed from Mr. Bhatia?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay, sure. I’m going to suggest that you both borrowed the money that was borrowed from Mr. Bhatia, because you couldn’t – you had financial issues, couldn’t your neighbour, which he is now claiming is about approximately $20,000. And you’re saying that that money was borrowed solely by Mr. Lee, I’m going to suggest that that’s incorrect.
A. If you can find a signature on the, on the IOU that’s mine, and Mr. Bhatia will say, yes, Angela owes it, yes, I will say, yes. But I did not sign any papers, and I’ve confirm that with Mr. Bhatia.
Q. I’m not talking about the money you lost. I’m talking about the money you borrowed because you were in financial difficulty.
A. I….
Q. But I’m going to move on now, Ms. de Cruz.
A. I did not, I did not, I did not borrow any money from Param Bhatia.
623The evidence is overwhelming that, in the summer to fall of 2007, the Lees were in deep financial trouble. They had lost their house. The Bhatias were the ultimate good neighbours and did everything humanly possible to help all three members of the Lee family. Mr. Bhatia was Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s witness and itemized the details of the loans made to the Lee’s. I accept Mr. Bhatia’s evidence on this point and reject Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s evidence that Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not personally borrow money from Mr. Bhatia.
Paying Her Rent
624Douglas Wilker was called as a witness by Ms. de Cruz-Lee. He is her current landlord at 616 Dogwood Lane, Waterloo and she has lived there since October 2010. She is supposed to pay rent of $200 per month. In cross-examination, at p. 36 of the November 18 transcript, the following exchange takes place:
Q: Does she pay rent
A: Occasionally, not all the time.
625In re-examination by Ms. de Cruz-Lee, Mr. Wilker indicated that occasionally meant “whenever she can afford it that she don’t have other bills”.
626Typical of the type of leading questions asked and improper testifying under the guise of questioning is the following exchange at p. 39-41 of the November 18 transcript:
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Okay. Q. Have I always paid you consistently rent before, before the, before the start of this year?
A. No, you haven’t.
Q. Okay, I haven’t consistently paid you but I paid you when I, when I got the money?
A. Correct.
THE COURT: Well, no now you’re testifying.
MS. MURTHI: Objection.
THE COURT: You got a bad answer that doesn’t mean, that doesn’t entitle you to correct him.
A. Yes, you do.
Q. So you would say that if I pay you…
THE COURT: No, no, no, that’s – now you’re putting words in his mouth. “You would say this…” No, and that’s going to say yes or no.
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Your Honour my mind a lot of times is occupied with court dates so when I miss a date or something like that, I will tell Mr. Wilker, I’ll owe him and then I’ll pay.
Q. So basically I’ve always paid everything I owed you, correct?
A. Correct.
MS. MURTHI: Objection.
Q. Do I owe you any outstanding payments?
A. Yes, you do.
Q. Okay. And I’m trying to explain that, that Your Honour….
THE COURT: Yes, I know but you’re asking questions and getting bad answers and then you got…
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Because it sounds bad because what it is, is Your Honour half the time I’m thinking about this court case and…
THE COURT: And what relevance does it have anyway, whether you pay debts or don’t pay debts?
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Well, it does show that the fact that I’ve been busy trying to get this – oh, okay, hang on.
THE COURT: Well how does it help you right now, you owe him money, how does that help?
MS. DE CRUZ-LEE: Q. Okay, do I owe you many money?
A. Yes, you do.
627Ms. de Cruz-Lee was asked about the failure to pay rent by Ms. Murthi at p. 42-44 of the February 9 transcript as follows:
THE COURT: Are you on ODSP at the time?
A. Yes, I am.
MS. MURTHI: Okay.
A. No. I – at that time, I – 2000, yes, I am.
MS. MURTHI: Q. So you didn’t have any money to purchase the home and no way to making it?
A. No. But I had help.
Q. Okay. We heard from your landlord, Mr. Wilker, he said you didn’t even pay him regularly the $200 a month you owed for rent.
A. No. He was talking about my tuition fees.
Q. No. He said, your rent. I asked him the question and he said that you sometimes pay your rent, that was what he said.
A. No.
Q. Do you remember him saying that?
A. No. He said, he was very nervous at that time with me, and he said, he’d made a mistake. You can call him back again.
Q. Ms., Ms. de Cruz, that’s not what he said. He said that you sometimes pay your rent. So you don’t remember hearing him say that?
A. Counsel Rupa, he was nervous at that time…
Q. That’s…
A. …and I told him not to come in until I – he’s still a witness, because is not sitting in, he can be cross-examined.
Q. Ms. de Cruz, he’s already given his testimony, and that’s not what I am asking. Whether he was nervous or not is irrelevant. I am saying that he said, you sometimes pay your rent of $200 a month.
A. Counsel Rupa, I have made decision with him based on the fact that if I had to hire a lawyer, I needed to keep enough money on my own, and he was in agreement in to that I owed him my tuition fees, yes.
628Mr. Wilker in his testimony clearly testified that Ms. de Cruz-Lee paid her rent occasionally when she did not have other bills. Tuition fees were never mentioned. Mr. Wilker was talking about rent. Even with Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s improper leading questions of Mr. Wilker, he never mentioned anything about tuition fees. Her testimony regarding tuition fees is not credible and I reject it. I accept that she paid her rent occasionally and owes Mr. Wilker money.
Ms.de Cruz-Lee’s Job and Income Status
629In Exhibit 6, filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee, Mr. Lee’s sworn statement indicates at para. 11:
The Respondent supported the Applicant in her educational endeavours at University and despite that the Applicant refused to work and instead focussed on sexual exploits with other men. The Applicant never worked at all during the course of the marriage despite being capable. The Applicant would raise fictitious issues such environmental allergies with no medical proof and other excuses why she could not work.
630In Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s financial statement, sworn on April 8, 2014, Tab 15 of the Trial Record, Ms. de Cruz-Lee states she has been unemployed since July 5, 2007. In Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s sworn application, sworn on August 19, 2010, Ms. de Cruz-Lee states at para. 8-12 that Ms. de Cruz-Lee stayed at home after Michelle’s birth on September 11, 1994 and home schooled Michelle. As a result, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was unable to work outside the home. Regarding business ventures, it is stated that the applicant has nothing to show for running her own business. This is contrary to Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s testimony in cross-examination that in 2001 she had a business that was paying – see p. 122 of December 5 transcript.
631At page 42, of the February 9 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee says she has been on ODSP since 2010. In 2013 she had no job when 56 Ravenscliffe was being sold (see p. 40-41 of February 9 transcript). At page 30 of the February 9 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated she has not paid any child support after separation because she had no job. At p. 120 of the December 5 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee says her multiple chemical sensitivity prevents her from working outside.
632Exhibit 53 is a series of Notices of Assessment for Ms. de Cruz-Lee for the years 2006-2010. In 2006, 2007, 2009 she made $1.00, $1.00 and $0.00 respectively. In 2008, she received $6,718 from pension income transferred to her, presumably from Mr. Lee. In 2010, she received $2,391 in social assistance payments.
633Pradeep Bhatia testified that he has known the parties over 10 years, since 2003. Ms. de Cruz-Lee has never held a steady job. She worked occasionally, one day here and there. To his knowledge, Mr. Lee earned the income – a military pension – and paid for the mortgage, utilities, etc. To his knowledge, only Mr. Lee was earning income.
634Ms. de Cruz-Lee was going to get a consulting fee from the mining business. She was not working as such at a job but she had business interests she was working on.
635As will be discussed later, the mining deals in the end provided no income to the Lee’s but in fact losses which cost them their home. Ms. de Cruz-Lee admitted in cross-examination at p. 132 of the December 5 transcipt that she did not get any money from the mining deals. She further admitted that she has no documentary proof – transaction receipt, cheque, etc. that Mr. Lee ever received money from Mr. Bigelow.
636There is not a shred of documentation or evidence that establishes that Ms. de Cruz-Lee, since her arrival in Canada in 1982 to the present, ever had a steady job or received any income whatsoever from any job or any of her businesses.
Re Purchase of Home - 1996
637Both parties testified that they paid the down payment for the purchase of 56 Ravenscliffe in 1996. Neither has any receipts or documentation to prove their claim. As discussed previously, Mr. Lee had a pension income and the evidence is clear that, from 1996 to 2007 (when they lost the house), he paid for the mortgage, taxes, utilities and all the bills on the house. He put the house in Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s name due to his age and medical condition.
638As also discussed previously, Ms. de Cruz-Lee since her arrival in Canada had never held a job or received any employment income. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she had environmental allergies described as multiple chemical sensitivity. She attended York University from 1992 until June 1995 when she graduated. At page 21 of the December 4 transcript she testifies “I purchased the house, 56 Ravenscliffe Court…using my own funds from my own illness.” Exhibit 9 was filed that shows the house was purchased on December 11, 1996 for $210,470.90. There was a mortgage given to the builders – Stars of Brampton.
639In cross-examination, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated that the down payment was borrowed from friends (not much) and from car accident money. None of the friends were in court as witnesses. One of them passed away.
640In short, Ms. de Cruz-Lee had just completed her university degree in 1995, had no job and income but somehow was able to come up with a down payment for an approximate $210,000 house. Her initial explanation in-chief was that it was some unspecified sum from her illness; that changed in cross-examination to loans from friends (not much) and a car accident sum and she saved a lot (see p. 117-118 of December 5 transcript).
641In her submissions on February 12, at p. 82, Ms. de Cruz-Lee submitted that the down payment came from pure gold, gold jewellery from Malaysia and art work that she did and sold and a car accident and savings.
642I reject all these varying explanations that Ms. de Cruz-Lee has regarding the down payment. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had just finished university and had a young child and no job or income. Mr. Lee had an income and paid for all the bills after the house was purchased including the mortgage and taxes. On a balance of probabilities, given that Mr. Lee had an income, Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not, and given the varying and unsubstantiated explanations by Ms. de Cruz-Lee regarding the down payment, I find that it is Mr. Lee who provided the down payment for the house.
2001 Fraud
643Exhibit 12 is a transfer document dated December 5, 2001 transferring 56 Ravenscliffe from Angela Judith de Cruz Lee to Larry Lee and Angela de Cruz Lee as joint tenants. Page 3 lists the purpose of the conveyance as being a gift. Kenneth James acted for both parties. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified she did not gift the house away. She would not give a house she bought for multiple chemical sensitivity. Her explanation is the 2001 Lorazepam prescription (Exhibit10) and that the gifting process was done without her knowledge (see p. 50 of the December 4 transcript). This was a fraud perpetrated on her. She only knew about this transaction in October 2012 when her lawyer Mark Trenholme told her about it. She only knew about it when Kenneth James was incarcerated by the RCMP in 2012.
644At page 51, of the December 4 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee thought that the house was still in her name only. She filed a complaint to the Law Society against Mr. James.
645In cross-examination of Ms. de Cruz-Lee, it was pointed out, that in 2001, the house needed to be re-financed and that, Ms. de Cruz-Lee needed to take out a mortgage with Home Trust company and would not qualify for a mortgage as she was earning no income. Ms. de Cruz-Lee continued to deny that the 2001 transfer was done with her knowledge.
646Exhibit 2, filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee, is an affidavit sworn by Mr. Lee. It indicates that Ms. de Cruz-Lee transferred the home from her to her and Larry Lee as joint tenants and lists the transfer as a gift. The transfer is dated December 5, 2001. On the very same day, December 5, 2001, the property was encumbered by a mortgage to Home Trust Company and a New Punjab loan. The total of these two mortgages on November 14, 2003 was estimated to be $217,000. These transactions are listed in the abstract entered as Exhibit 42.
647It is obvious, and I infer from the circumstances, that the home was up for mortgage renewal in 2001 and as Ms. de Cruz-Lee had no job and income, she transferred the home to her and Mr. Lee so that the home could be refinanced as Mr. Lee had an income and she did not.
648Accordingly, I reject her evidence that she did not consent to the 2001 transfer and was unaware of it until 2012. I find that she was aware of the 2001 transfer, consented to it, and gifted the house to her and Larry Lee as joint tenants in order to refinance the property.
The Mining Business and CIBC Fraud
649Ms. de Cruz-Lee maintains that there were a series of frauds that occurred by CIBC and her mining business associates.
650A numbered company was set up with Mr. Lee doing the legal and accounting work.
651As Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated at p. 127 of the December 5 transcript, “Counsel Rupa, I am the one that was the mining business.” Mr. Lee got involved and testified that he prepared documents while she was kicking the chair on which he was sitting. Michelle testified that her father was submissive to her mother and did what she told him to do. The preponderance of the evidence is that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was the operating mind during the Lee’s involvement in the mining business.
652Ms. de Cruz-Lee thought her big breakthrough was the purchase and sale of a mining property known as Vansickle. The transaction appears to be in two parts. Exhibit 4B has Larry Lee and Verdun Bigelow as purchasers and Angela de Cruz-Lee for Dr. Kretschmar as sellers. Bigelow and Larry Lee agreed to purchase the mine for $500,000. $250,000 was to be paid by Mr. Bigelow from a loan on Mr. Bigelow’s house. Mr. Lee’s $250,000 share was to come from future production and sales.
653The contract had five parts as follows:
(1) Verdun Bigelow was to pay off the Lee’s mortgage at 56 Ravenscliffe.
(2) Verdun Bigelow was to pay $38,000 to Ms. de Cruz-Lee for a consulting fee.
(3) Bigelow was to arrange for his mortgage loan by January 15, 2004.
(4) Bigelow was not to hold Larry Lee or Angela de Cruz-Lee liable for any loans he obtains.
(5) Unspecified documents signed by Larry Lee and Angela de Cruz-Lee on November 3, 2003 were to be destroyed and not used.
654There was a 30 day cooling off period and on December 7, 2003, the contract was valid and binding.
655Exhibit 4A also contains an agreement of purchase and sale wherein Angela de Cruz-Lee was to purchase the Vansickle property from Kretschmar for $56,000 cash to be paid by March 1, 2004 at which time the agreement expires. The agreement was signed on January 8, 2004 and required a deposit of $5,000 deposit to take effect. The Vansickle property was assessed to be valued at $112,000.
656In my opinion, this was a speculative venture which had the attractive potential promise to Ms. de Cruz-Lee of buying a property for $56,000 (half its value) and then flipping it to Bigelow and Lee for 10 times that amount plus $38,000 in commission, plus paying off a mortgage valued at $217,000. So for a $56,000 investment, Ms. de Cruz-Lee stood to realize $750,000 approximately. It sounds too good to be true and it was. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had no job, no income. Mr. Lee had a modest pension income of $29,000. The only asset they had was the equity in their home. I find that the only way that the Lee’s could follow through with paying the $56,000 and probably the $5,000 deposit was to leverage their home, at least until Bigelow paid up on Exhibit 4B. The evidence by both Mr. Lee and Ms. de Cruz-Lee as to what happened next is extremely sketchy. Exhibit 42 shows that on November 14, 2003 a transfer of their home was made to Mr. Bigelow. This was done 7 days after the Exhibit 4B agreement of purchase and sale involving Bigelow. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says this was done fraudulently by using documents that were to be destroyed. The Exhibit 4B agreement at point 4 says certain documents were to be destroyed but does not say what they were.
657Exhibit 42 further shows that on January 6, 2004 the Verdun Bigelow charge is deleted and a CIBC Mortgage Inc. replaced it. The other two mortgages were then discharged. This was done two days before Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed her agreement to buy Vansickle for $56,000 on payment terms to be agreed upon, but to not take effect until $5,000 was paid, which was to be paid to Kretschmar. Exhibit 4C shows a TD transfer of $3,000 and $2,000 for a total of $5,000, with the $2,000 going to Kretschmar. This TD transfer was dated March 17, 2004 and made reference to payment for the Vansickle mine. Ms. de Cruz-Lee at p. 53-55 of the December 5 transcript confirms this TD transfer was paid for the deal she had with Kretschmar. Mr. Lee testified that Mr. Bigelow got on title but does not know how that happened. He testified that CIBC was not part of any fraud; they just took over the first and second mortgages and they paid everything off. At page 43 of the February 11 transcript, Mr. Lee indicated that the CIBC mortgage was used to cover all the existing mortgages and “whatever else was on it and mining business and all these things”. Mr. Lee testified at p. 42-43 of the February 11 transcript that they could not get a mortgage, so Verdun helped us get a mortgage on CIBC. At p. 43-44 of the February 11 transcript, Mr. Lee testified that there were debts owing for the mining business
658Exhibit 15 shows the transfer of the Bigelow mortgage to CIBC on December 31, 2003 in the amount of $238,250 (see p. 41-42 of the February 11 transcript).
659Returning to Exhibit 2, the affidavit of Mr. Lee, paragraph 7 indicates that $217,000 was owing on November 14, 2003. Putting Exhibit 15 and Exhibit 2 together, in one month the mortgage debt rose by $20,000. The Lee’s could not get a new mortgage. Bigelow could. The CIBC mortgage was registered on January 6, 2004 (see Exhibit 42). Two days later, Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed Exhibit 4A which required $5,000 upon signing and $56,000 later on terms. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had approximately $20,000 to play with. At p. 44-45 of the February 11 transcript, Mr. Lee in cross-examination confirmed that the CIBC mortgage was $20,000 more than the previous mortgage and $21,000 was used for mining debts and whatever else. Accordingly, it was the CIBC mortgage that gave Ms. de Cruz-Lee the funds to pay the $5,000 deposit and start on the way to make further $5,000 payments as reflected by the Exhibit 4C $5,000 payment made by way of TD transfer to Kretschmar on March 17, 2004.
660Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she was totally unaware of what was going on. It was fraud. An analysis of the documents and evidence reveals that the CIBC mortgage was done for her benefit to pursue her dreams of making big money with little effort. Mr. Lee was left, as always, to pay the bills on a limited pension income. He testified that the CIBC mortgage was used to pay off the other mortgages, mining business and whatever else.
661Mr. Lee is right. The CIBC mortgage was not as a result of fraud. It was put on title to fund Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s dreams of obtaining significant wealth on a speculative mining deal. I reject her evidence that the CIBC mortgage was a fraud.
Aftermath of CIBC Mortgage
662After the CIBC mortgage was put on, the Lees financial situation worsened. According to Mr. Lee, their furniture went to Bigelow’s home. Mr. Lee was faced with increased mortgage payments. Ms. de Cruz-Lee was paying off a $56,000 debt with no income of her own and a shrinking base of $20,000 gained from the CIBC mortgage. Mr. Bigelow did not hold up his end of the Exhibit 4B deal. Neither Mr. Lee or Ms. de Cruz-Lee received any payments from Mr. Bigelow. The documents described as revocation of living trust dated July 2005 (Exhibit 13) and power of attorney document dated January 5, 2006 (Exhibit 14A) were attempts to enforce the Exhibit 4B agreement but obviously failed. Mr. Bigelow did not live up to his commitments in the Exhibit 4B contract and neither Mr. Lee or Ms. de Cruz-Lee received any monies from him.
663Accordingly on January 6, 2006, the property was transferred back from Bigelow to the Lee’s. On March 3, 2007, the Lee’s transferred the home to Mr. Kretschmar for reasons not clearly set out in the evidence.
664What is clear is that Mr. Lee was unable to keep up with the higher mortgage payments. Exhibit 18 shows that on October 16, 2006 CIBC obtained a judgment of $236,040.40 against the Lee’s and Bigelow for defaulting on the mortgage.
665Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s dreams of quick wealth had by now dissipated. Bigelow did not pay and there would be no way for Ms. de Cruz-Lee to pay the entire $56,000 to obtain her mine. And even if she did, there was now no one to flip it to.
666I find that Ms. de Cruz-Lee refused to accept any blame for this debacle and simply blamed everyone else: Bigelow, Kretschmar, CIBC, various lawyers and ultimately Mr. Lee himself for defrauding her.
667There was no fraud. She took a chance on a speculative deal and lost. Michelle Lee summed it up best when she said they got kicked out of the house because her mother fumbled a mining deal.
2007 Recovery of Home
668On July 5, 2007, the chickens came home to roost and the Lee’s were removed from the home pursuant to the CIBC judgment. Their neighbours, the Bhatias, were knights in shining armour who did everything they could to help. As previously indicated, $20,000 was loaned to the Lee’s to help them in their time of financial need. $5,000 was given to a lawyer, Mr. Mand regarding the alleged CIBC mortgage fraud but he did nothing. Mr. Lee made a complaint to the Law Society. According to Michelle Lee, Ms. de Cruz-Lee blamed most of what happened on Mr. Lee. While they were living at the Howard Johnson in the fall of 2007, Ms. de Cruz-Lee kicked Mr. Lee in the head while they were in the car. It was left to Mr. Lee and the Bhatias to do something to salvage the situation.
669Pradeep’s father, Prem Bhatia had good credit and contacts with the TD Bank. Ms. de Cruz-Lee had not job, no income and terrible credit. Exhibit 19 is a credit report dated 02/10/07 that shows Ms. de Cruz-Lee owed Mr. Bigelow $29,090 and her Visa was in default and assigned to a third party for collection.
670According to Pradeep Bhatia, the lawyer Paul Mand was retained to conduct a court action against CIBC to vacate the “fraudulent” mortgage but Paul Mand required $305,000 to be paid into court. The court action would take months.
671By December 2007, the Lee’s had been in the Howard Johnson for four months. The daughter was attending school for the first time. The Bhatias decided that the goal was to put the Lee’s back into the house before Christmas. The daughter, Michelle Lee was the biggest concern for them.
672At p. 104 of the November 18 transcript, Pradeep Bhatia indicates his father wanted to get on title as much as possible. The TD Bank told his father that he needed to be on title at least one per cent in order to get the mortgage; otherwise it would not be possible. Pradeep’s father did not want to be on title, it was not supposed to be long term. The father did it reluctantly. So, in December 2007, there was a mortgage put on the house and title to the house was put in Larry Lee’s name and the father’s name. It was his father, who through the father’s broker, was able to arrange the financing for the $305,000. Mr. Bhatia testified that both Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Mr. Lee came to them for help.
673Mr. Bhatia testified that in 2007, Ms. de Cruz-Lee was central to everything at that point. Regarding the $5,000 loan for the retainer for Mr. Mand, the $7,800 emergency loan to Mr. Lee in December 2007, and the $305,000, Mr. Bhatia indicates at p. 83 of the November 18 transcript, “Yes, she (Ms. de Cruz-Lee) was present in all the meetings.” The only meeting she was not involved with was the $7,800 emergency loan to Mr. Lee by Mr. Bhatia which Mr. Lee took to their real estate lawyer Mr. Vani.
674Exhibit 37 is a compilation of documents sent by Mr. Vani to Mr. Trenholme with copies of the real estate transaction documents. Page 3 of 10 is an acknowledgement and direction regarding “Lee/de Cruz-Lee transfer to Lee/Bhatia”. It is dated October 30, 2007. Both Michelle Lee and Mr. Lee testified that they are familiar with Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature and testified that Ms. de Cruz-Lee signed this document. At p. 4 of 11, there is a transfer; the transferors are Ms. de Cruz-Lee and Mr. Lee and the transferees are Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia in the capacity of joint tenants. Joint tenants is scratched out and replaced by tenants in common (99 per cent for Mr. Lee) and tenants in common (1 per cent) for Prem Bhatia. Both Michelle Lee and Mr. Lee testified that Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s initials appear on this document. The change to 99 per cent / 1 per cent for Mr. Lee / Prem Bhatia is consistent with Pradeep’s testimony that his father wanted minimal involvement on the title and was put on title for 1 per cent in order to obtain the mortgage. Page 6 of 11 indicates that TD had a mortgage of $305,000 and the chargors are Prem Bhatia and Larry Lee and Ms. de Cruz-Lee consented to the transactions. Page 11 of 11 is a spousal consent to registration indicating that Ms. de Cruz-Lee consents to the Lee/Bhatia mortgage to TD. It is dated November 2007. Both Michelle Lee and Larry Lee testified that they recognize Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signature on this document.
675Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s attendance and signing of these documents is consistent with Mr. Bhatia’s testimony that she was central to what was going on and attended all the meetings.
676At p. 160-161 of the December 4 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates that Mr. Lee is only “one per cent on title and illegally one per cent” and on November 9, 2010 he (Larry Lee) was only illegally one per cent owner and Ms. de Cruz-Lee has paperwork to show he (Larry Lee) is one per cent owner and “it’s coming”. No such paperwork was ever presented. At page 24 of the February 9 transcript Ms. de Cruz-Lee states, “You can’t bring up 2012 September 20th, … and not look at the fact that Mr. Lee prior to this was one per cent owner”.
677Exhibit 37 also refers to a transfer done on July 17, 2012. Exhibit 42 shows that on December 10, 2007 the transfer to Lee/Bhatia was registered. The original intent was to register Lee/Bhatia as 99 per cent/1 per cent tenant in common owners as per the Exhibit 37 documents. It appears that in error, the transfer that was registered was a transfer from De Cruz-Lee/Lee to Lee/Bhatia – see Exhibit 39 transfer document PR13934465 which appears on the abstract on December 20, 2007 in Exhibit 42. This was corrected on July 17, 2012 by registering the corrected transfer that was signed and initialled on October 30, 2012 as indicated in Exhibit 37. Exhibit 37 has a note from Mr. Vani to this effect. In Exhibit 32, in a letter dated October 3, 2012, Mr. Trenholme advises Ms. de Cruz-Lee that the recent July 2012 transaction “simply corrected a previous error and currently title is held 99 per cent by Mr. Lee and 1 per cent to Bhatia”. Mr. Trenholme further indicates that “the documents provided by Mr. Vani (see Exhibit 37) seem to bear out that you attended at that lawyer’s office, you provided the appropriate identification and consented to the transactions as required.”
678I find that these comments made by Mr. Trenholme, in the October 30, 2012, letter to Ms. de Cruz-Lee, are confirmed in their entirety by the evidence of Mr. Bhatia, Michelle Lee, Larry Lee and the exhibits filed by Ms. de Cruz-Lee.
679Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s evidence is that Mr. Bhatia, upon learning of the 2012 transaction, was very angry “because it changed from tenant in common to, I believe common something and then he gave his father 99 per cent and gave Larry one per cent”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee disagrees that she consented as indicated by Mr. Trenholme in his letter. At p. 5 of the December 5 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee states “So in 2007 they must have had Mr. Larry Lee at 1 per cent because when it’s altered its 99 per cent”.
680She indicates, at p. 6 of the December 5 transcript, that the alterations done in Exhibit 37 changing the transfer to Lee/Bhatia as joint tenants to tenants in common, 99 per cent for Mr. Lee and 1 per cent for Prem Bhatia were “not done by me and this paperwork, I did not consent to it.”
681Referring to her apparent signature on page 11/11 of Exhibit 37 providing her consent to the transfer in November 2007, she indicates at p. 7 of the December 5 transcript,, “It looks like my signature but I don’t believe it is mine”. Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicates that when Mr. Lee made his motion on November 9, 2010 before Justice Ricchetti, Mr. Lee “was only one per cent owner and he said he was the total owner”.
682In cross-examination, Ms. de Cruz-Lee indicated there was no intent for anyone to be on a mortgage. At page 154-155 of the December 5 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee is referred to page 11/11 of the Exhibit 37 documents and that she signed the spousal consent that appears at page 11/11. Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did not sign the consent and did not consent as indicated in the acknowledgement and direction.
683At p. 149 of the December 5 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee states she did not provide her driver’s licence as set out in Exhibit 37. Ms. de Cruz-Lee says that the acknowledgement and direction regarding Lee/de Cruz-Lee transfer to Lee/Bhatia has a signature that “looks like my signature”. Regarding p. 4 of 11 of Exhibit 37, Ms. de Cruz-Lee denies it is her initials beside the change from joint tenants to tenants in common. At p. 160 of the December 5 transcript, Ms. de Cruz-Lee testified that she did not know about the 2007 transfers.
684Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s submission to me at p. 121-123 of the February 12 transcript was that she knew she was out of the house on July 5, 2007 and returned on December 21, 2007. She knew nothing about the transfer from de Cruz-Lee to Lee/Bhatia on December 20, 2007. She knew nothing about the $305,000 mortgage. It was all done without her consent and/or knowledge. She was under the impression there was going to a lawsuit against CIBC. She provided no documentation of a lawsuit. She thought she was able to move back on December 21, 2007 because CIBC had made a mistake by doing what they did. She thought she was still the owner.
685I reject this submission in its entirety. The evidence of her own witness Mr. Bhatia was that Ms. de Cruz-Lee was central to everything and attended the lawyer’s meetings. I accept the evidence of her family members that it is Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s signatures on the real estate documents in Exhibit 37. I reject her evidence that she did not sign the papers and knew nothing of what is happening as it both defies common sense, the sworn evidence of Mr. Bhatia, Michelle Lee, Larry Lee and the documents that Ms. de Cruz-Lee, herself, filed as exhibits. I am further fortified in this conclusion in that the 2007 transfers enured considerably to her benefit.
686The 2007 transfer to Lee/Bhatia and the registration of the $305,000 TD mortgage benefitted Ms. de Cruz-Lee in three material ways:
(1) It permitted Ms. de Cruz-Lee to return to the home of her dreams on December 21, 2007.
(2) It dissolved the $236,000 judgment outstanding against her by CIBC since October, 2006.
(3) Given that she had no job, no income and was no longer on title, it made her basically judgment proof for the debts she had outstanding as outlined in the credit bureau report in Exhibit 19. It is obvious that Ms. de Cruz-Lee could not qualify for a mortgage given her bad credit/lack of income. At p. 162 of the December 5 transcript she agrees she cannot even qualify for a credit card but blames it on not having any identification.
(4) I find that Ms. de Cruz-Lee is a university educated individual and had considerable experience with lawyers and real estate transactions and gifted her interest in the home in 2007 for the three purposes outlined above, all of which provided her with immediate and significant personal benefit.
Aftermath of 2007 Transfer
687As indicated in her income tax forms (Exhibit 53), 2014 financial statement – Tab 15 of trial record and her testimony, Ms. de Cruz-Lee did not work and earned no money after the Lee’s returned to 56 Ravenscliffe. In 2010, she started to “earn” social assistance payments when she left 56 Ravenscliffe.
688Mr. Lee continued to pay all the bills on the home including mortgage, utilities and taxes without any assistance from Ms. de Cruz-Lee. If Mr. Lee was unable to keep up with the payments for the approximate $230,000 CIBC mortgage it would be anticipated that he would have difficulty keeping up with the $305,000 TD mortgage. This is exactly what happened.
689Pradeep Bhatia indicated that from 2007 onwards, Larry was responsible for the payments. Towards the end of 2012, payments were not being made on time and the mortgage went into default. Property taxes were not being paid. TD Bank called threatening to initiate Power of Sale proceedings. The Bhatias decided they had no choice but to sell the house to receive the money. If the power of sale went through, the bank would have total control and if the bank sold the house for less than the mortgage, they could be on the hook for the remaining amount. Mr. Trenholme, Angela de Cruz-Lee’s lawyer, brought a motion to sell the house on April 26, 2013.
690The motion was brought before Justice Price on April 26, 2013, by Mark Trenholme, solicitor for Angela de Cruz-Lee. Present as well was Larry Lee and Prem Bhatia. As can be seen at Tab 7 of the trial record, Justice Price ordered the house sold. The house was sold at the end of April 2013. Mr. Bhatia believed Angela had okayed this because “this is her lawyer”.
691According to Mr. Bhatia, he had no knowledge that Angela was not okay with the house sale, Angela was very, very upset, crying as this house was her life because of her illness and she bought it for that purpose. This leads us to the next chapter which I refer to as the alleged Mark Trenholme fraud.
Alleged Mark Trenholme Fraud
692As can be seen from Tab 14 of Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s application, Ms. de Cruz-Lee’s original lawyer in