Sherry A. Kettle

The plaintiff brought an action against the defendants for environmental contamination migrating from the defendants' property onto the plaintiff's adjacent lands.

The court found that chlorinated solvents (TCE) originated from the defendants' property and flowed via groundwater onto the plaintiff's lands.

The court held the defendants liable in nuisance, negligence, and trespass.

The court also pierced the corporate veil, finding the individual defendant jointly and severally liable due to his egregious conduct and failure to remediate the property despite promises to do so.

The court ordered the defendants to remediate their property and awarded damages of $1,809,908.80, with a further $2,800,000 payable if remediation is not completed on schedule.

The defendants brought a motion on the eve of trial seeking an adjournment, leave to serve a late expert report, and leave to amend their Statement of Defence to add a counterclaim.

The underlying action involved allegations of environmental contamination flowing from the defendants' property to the plaintiff's property.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the individual defendant, who had been self-represented for much of the litigation, had known about the issues for years but failed to act until the eve of trial.

The court held that granting the relief would cause significant delay and non-compensable prejudice to the plaintiff.

The applicants sought to discharge a collateral mortgage without paying a $4.25 million 'Participation Amount' owed to the respondents.

The applicants argued the Participation Amount was invalid on several grounds, including that it was a clog on the equity of redemption, offended section 8 of the Interest Act, constituted a criminal rate of interest under section 347 of the Criminal Code, violated the Unconscionable Transactions Relief Act, and was an unenforceable penalty.

The court rejected all these arguments, finding the Participation Amount was a valid collateral advantage agreed to by sophisticated commercial parties in exchange for forbearance.

The court ordered the funds held in court to be paid to the respondents.

The mortgagors brought a motion for leave to file an expert report regarding the calculation of a criminal rate of interest under s. 347 of the Criminal Code, after having conducted cross-examinations.

The mortgagees opposed the motion and brought a cross-motion seeking an order that the mortgagors pay an additional sum into court to secure the increased interest and costs resulting from the delay.

The court granted the mortgagors leave to file the expert report, but ordered them to pay an additional $106,500 into court to mitigate the prejudice to the mortgagees caused by the delay and the need to respond to the late-filed report.

The plaintiffs sued the defendants for damages arising from the purchase of a defective wind turbine from one of the defendant corporations.

The defendants brought a motion for summary judgment to dismiss the claims against two affiliated corporations, arguing they were separate legal entities.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the plaintiffs' claims regarding lifting the corporate veil, agency, and pure economic loss for negligent manufacture raised genuine issues requiring a trial, particularly given the conflicting evidence on the degree of control and integration among the corporations.