Zane Handysides

The court determined costs following a lengthy custody and access dispute where the applicant mother was found to have emotionally abused the children and engaged in severe parental alienation against the respondent father.

The court found the mother acted in bad faith throughout the proceedings, litigating with impunity to excise the father from the children's lives.

Applying Rule 24(8) of the Family Law Rules, the court awarded the successful father full recovery costs fixed at $400,000.

This was a review of a 2011 supervised custody order that had placed the children in the mother's custody subject to strict conditions to repair their relationship with their father.

The court found that the mother failed to comply with the order and continued to emotionally abuse the children by fostering a distorted, fearful reality of their father, amounting to severe parental alienation.

Relying on surreptitious audio recordings and CAS reports, the court concluded the children remained in need of protection.

Sole custody was transferred to the father, and the mother was restricted to supervised access during therapy sessions.