Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Posts Tagged ‘Canada’

Falls off his mountain bike

By reader acclaim, from Canada:

A mountain biker who launched a million-dollar lawsuit after falling off his bike has lit a fire under Collingwood area bike enthusiasts who fear the suit will close their trails. James Leone is suing the Toronto Outing Club and its Kolapore Uplands Wilderness Ski Trails Committee as well as the Town of The Blue Mountains, the Grey-Bruce Trails Network and the province for an accident he had while mountain biking last August.

The 31-year-old personal injury lawyer from Toronto claims he suffered fractured vertebrae and several soft-tissue injuries when his bicycle came to an abrupt stop after hitting a hole in the trail, sending him over the handlebars.

A trail specialist with the International Mountain Bike Association, Laura Woolner, said the case could have an “enormous impact on non-profit clubs” because of the need to buy expensive insurance: “Essentially it could shut them down,” she said. (Tracy McLaughlin, “Lawsuit a threat to trails”, Toronto Sun, Apr. 17). Fark has a long, disrespectful thread. More: the hazards of mountain biking also figured in Ted’s Mar. 29 entry.

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Canada: provincial tobacco copycat suits

Bad ideas from the U.S. hit Canada ten years later dept.: two Canadian provinces are seeking to replicate the success of state attorneys general in the U.S. and scoop up large amounts of money from tobacco companies through lawsuits without the bother of raising taxes. British Columbia’s legislature followed the lead of several U.S. states (Florida, Maryland and Vermont) and enacted an explicitly retroactive “we win, you lose” statute undercutting tobacco companies’ defenses against cost recoupment. Now Manitoba has joined in, its decision announced by Theresa Oswald, who bears the scary title of Healthy Living Minister. (“Manitoba to back B.C. in tobacco case”, CBC, Feb. 25)(B.C. law).

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Canada: “Stripper paid after tiger attack”

“A stripper mauled by a tiger in an Ontario safari park has won $650,000 in damages because her scars meant she could no longer work, Canadian media said on Friday.” Jennifer-Anne Cowles was awarded “some $650,000 in damages, almost half of it to compensate for income she would have made as a stripper. Her musician boyfriend, David Balac, won Canadian $1.7 million ($1.37 million), because his injuries left him unable to work as an accordion player.” (Reuters/CNN, Jan. 31). James Taranto at WSJ “Best of the Web” comments (Jan. 31): “Canada has some surprising priorities if an accordion player is worth twice as much as a stripper.” (& letter to the editor Feb. 13).

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Canadian court: co. to blame for unionist’s bomb

A Canadian employer has now been held partly to blame for a murderous onslaught by one of its adversaries in a labor dispute:

A court has awarded $10.7 million in damages to the widows of nine men killed by a bomb during a labour dispute at Yellowknife’s Giant Mine, blaming the mining company and the union almost as much as the man who laid the explosives….

Justice Arthur Lutz ruled that none of the involved parties did enough to control the relentless and escalating violence on the picket line that summer. He assigned almost equal blame to the union, Royal Oak Mines and Roger Warren, who was convicted of the murders. Lutz also assigned a share of the damages to Pinkerton’s security, two union activists and the N.W.T. government….

Royal Oak had argued that it couldn’t have predicted the deaths, but Lutz scorned the reasoning. … The judge said violence and threats were rampant during the 18-month strike, including physical injuries, property damage and sabotage. Strikers staked out the houses of replacement workers and stole explosives from the mine, setting off one blast that cut off power to a hospital.

(“Giant Mine widows awarded $10.7M”, CBC, Dec. 16).

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Update: Canadian loser-pays

In my brief essay on loser-pays posted early in the history of this site, I observed: “While some loser-pays jurisdictions suspend the principle [of costs following the event] for what are viewed as true ‘cases of first impression’ where there is no established law, most are skeptical about applying any exemption more liberally, as one sees in this 1996 case from Alberta, Canada.” A belated update on that case, Vriend v. Alberta: on appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada, the plaintiff in 1998 won his case on the merits (with an award of costs), thus presumably escaping any need to pay costs arising from his “case of first impression” loss at the earlier stage. Thanks to Doris Wilson of the Alberta Law Reform Institute for calling my attention to this.

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Update: James Blair Down case

More developments in the Madison County case (Mar. 25, etc.) that Prof. Lester Brickman called “the most abusive class-action settlement of the decade, if not the century.” “Circuit Judge Phillip J. Kardis approved on Thursday a plan to notify potential claimants in the suit against Canadian con man James Blair Down.” However, New York attorney Jody Pope, representing objectors, says class members are not receiving proper notification of their right to make claims. The case involves prominent plaintiff’s firms Ness Motley (now Motley Rice) and Korein Tillery. (Paul Hampel, “Suit against con man nears settlement”, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Sept. 9).

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Drops baby from bridge, sues bridge owner over stress

Vancouver: “Nadia Hama, who dropped her infant daughter from the Capilano Suspension Bridge nearly five years ago, is pressing ahead with a suit against the operators of the privately owned tourist attraction. … Hama’s daughter Kaya, then 17 months old, miraculously survived the plunge after tree branches broke her 150-foot fall into the rocky canyon.” (“Woman who dropped baby from bridge sues bridge owner for stress”, Canadian Press/ AZCentral.com, Aug. 24). We last covered the case Oct. 8, 2001.

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Canada: dog alimony arrives

“For the first time in Canada, a court has ordered a man to give his ex-wife monthly support payments for their dog. Kenneth Duncan, a truck driver in Edmonton, was told to pay $200 a month in alimony towards the upkeep of Crunchy, a St. Bernard. …Had Crunchy been a child, the monthly payment would have been $691.” (“Albertan ordered to pay ex-wife $200 a month for pet support”, CBC News, Aug. 10). More on pets in divorce: Feb. 17, 2003; May 14-15, 2002.

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Capped in Canada

Pain and suffering awards — not just in suits against doctors, but in suits generally — top out at $280,000 (U.S. $210,000) in our northern neighbor’s courtrooms. More details at Point of Law (Olson, Krauss, Krauss). Also discussed there this week: a new report on the incidence of medical errors (Krauss, Olson). And Jim Copland, the site’s managing editor, dares tort czar Fred Baron to substantiate his claim that drug, insurance and chemical companies “have spent over $200 million over the last five years in ad campaigns that make trial lawyers look like villains”.

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