Tamara Ramsey

At a case conference, the applicant landlord requested an interim order requiring the respondent commercial tenant and its indemnifiers to pay outstanding rental arrears and ongoing rent until the application hearing.

The court ordered the respondents to pay full monthly rent going forward, but declined to make an order regarding accumulated arrears as the respondents' counsel had just been retained and needed time to respond.

This motion concerned a failed asset purchase agreement for a homecare franchise.

The applicant, 2712349 Ontario Incorporated, sought to recover a $65,000 "down payment" made to the personal respondent, Crystal Louis, after failing to secure financing.

The court addressed whether the applicant acted reasonably and in good faith in terminating the agreement based on the financing condition, whether the payment was refundable, and if the personal respondent was jointly and severally liable for its repayment on the basis of unjust enrichment.

The court found that the applicant acted reasonably and in good faith, the $65,000 payment was refundable as a down payment (not a non-refundable deposit), and Crystal Louis was jointly and severally liable with the corporate respondent for its return due to unjust enrichment.

The moving parties, trustees of a family trust, sought to consolidate or temporarily stay an application for a passing of accounts and declarations of breach of fiduciary duty, pending the outcome of a complex related action concerning the ownership of family businesses.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the two proceedings did not share common questions of fact or law, and that delaying the application would prejudice the beneficiaries' right to a timely accounting and preservation of trust assets.

The court determined costs following the dismissal of a defendant’s motion for summary judgment.

The plaintiff sought costs on a full indemnity scale or alternatively on a partial indemnity scale, arguing the motion should never have been brought.

The court declined to award full indemnity costs, noting that summary judgment jurisprudence was still developing following amendments to the Rules of Civil Procedure and the decision in Combined Air Mechanical Services Inc. v. Flesch.

While the court found the time spent by counsel generally reasonable given the factual complexity and cross‑examinations, it concluded the amount sought exceeded what the defendant could reasonably have expected to pay.

The plaintiff was awarded $65,000 in fees and disbursements.

The defendant brought a motion for summary judgment arguing that the plaintiff’s action to recover funds advanced during a former romantic relationship was barred by the applicable limitation period.

The dispute concerned whether substantial funds used for the renovation of the defendant’s law office constituted a loan or a gift and whether the defendant, a lawyer who had professional dealings with the plaintiff’s business, owed and breached a fiduciary duty.

The court held that the nature of the parties’ personal and professional relationship, the characterization of the transactions, and the existence of any fiduciary duty or conflict of interest required credibility findings that could not be made on a summary judgment motion.

The court also noted that the resolution of these issues could affect whether a limitation period applied.

The motion for summary judgment was therefore dismissed.

The plaintiff brought a motion for leave to amend a defamation action after the trial record had been filed, seeking to expand the claim to include intentional infliction of mental suffering, conspiracy to injure, malicious prosecution, and damages under s. 61 of the Family Law Act.

The proposed amendments relied in part on an alleged assignment of rights from the plaintiff’s son arising from criminal proceedings that had resulted in his acquittal.

The court held that the evidentiary foundation for the alleged assignment was deficient and, in any event, causes of action based on personal torts such as malicious prosecution and conspiracy were not assignable.

The court further held that the conspiracy and Family Law Act claims were legally untenable as pleaded.

Leave to amend was granted only to add a claim for intentional infliction of mental and emotional distress related to the alleged defamation.