25 February 2019
By Michael BookmanWhen should a successor company be forced to pay an advance on legal fees to predecessor shareholders whom the successor company is suing? The recent motion decision in Noranco v MidOcean Partners III1 might give pause to successor companies considering legal action against the selling shareholders who may be indemnified, under certain circumstances.
6 February 2019
By Cynthia SpryThe Globe and Mail has suggested that the fall of the Fortress group of companies “could become Canada’s largest syndicated mortgage failure”, as “[b]etween 2008 and 2017, Fortress … raised a staggering $920 million from 14,000 retail investors to fund mortgages for an array of developments.”
7 January 2019
By Uri SnirIn a recent decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal, the Court found that a motion judge erred in awarding partial summary judgment and dismissing a professional negligence claim against a law firm.
20 December 2018
By Brendan MonahanWhen will a court lift the automatic stay imposed under the Rules of Civil Procedure when a final or interlocutory order for the payment of money is appealed? The Ontario Court of Appeal recently considered this question in Popa v. Popa, 2018 ONCA 972. In this case, the Court granted an order lifting the stay, finding that the responding parties were “utterly untrustworthy” and that there was a serious risk that funds would be siphoned off if the stay was not lifted.
4 December 2018
By Eden KaillEvery law firm’s Twitter account, Babin Bessner Spry included, has a standard list of follows: Colleagues, other firms, bar associations, other legal associations like TLA and the Advocates“ Society.
These are often informative, but not always the most entertaining. Thank goodness for my favourite sub-category of Law Twitter:
Hilarious Law Twitter!
26 November 2018
By Uri SnirThe Ontario Court of Appeal has further clarified the distinction between litigation expert witnesses and participant expert witnesses. The distinction is crucial in determining what type of evidence is admissible at trial.
In this recent decision, the Court held that much of the expert evidence given at trial should have been inadmissible. It allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial in the underlying sexual assault action.
12 November 2018
By Michael BookmanCanada is one of the only industrialized countries in the world to lack a national securities regulator. That may be about to change after the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) concluded in Reference re Pan Canadian Securities Regulation that a proposed national cooperative for the regulation of the capital markets was indeed constitutional. The SCC has given the green light to a cooperative capital markets regulatory system fashioned collectively among some of the provinces and territories and the federal government.
1 November 2018
By Brendan Monahan
In Hashemi-Sabet Estate v. Oak Ridges Pharmasave Inc., 2018 ONCA 839, the Ontario Court of Appeal recently considered the principles relating to the enforcement of an accepted Rule 49 offer to settle. In this case, the Court upheld a motion judge’s decision granting judgment in accordance with an accepted Rule 49 offer. The Court also held that it was open to the motion judge to find that counsel for one of the parties had intentionally submitted inaccurate information to advance her clients’ position, without hearing viva voce evidence on that issue.
23 October 2018
By Uri SnirOn September 26, 2018, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice sentenced Daniel Tiffin to six months in jail for violations of the Securities Act (the “Act”). Tiffin and his company, Tiffin Financial Corporation (“TFC”) (collectively, the “Respondents”), were convicted of:
18 October 2018
By Cynthia SpryIn a recent decision of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, the court found that a corporation without share capital, apparently incorporated for the purpose of commencing the litigation, after the majority of the events in question, was not a “proper person” to claim oppression within the meaning of section 250(e) of the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act (the “CNCA”).