In a series of stunning developments on October 26, 2014, the CBC announced that information had come to the Corporation’s attention which caused it to terminate the employment of radio host Jian Ghomeshi. This prompted a press release from Mr. Ghomeshi’s lawyers, that he intended to file a lawsuit seeking $50,000,000 in damages, as well...
David Boies is a legendary litigator, having been involved in many of the leading civil cases in the United States. Early in his career, he defended IBM against anti-trust charges and CBS in a hard fought libel case brought by William Westmoreland. When the U.S. government launched a legal case against Microsoft, it turned to...
The Supreme Court of Canada decision in Hryniak v. Mauldin, 2014 SCC 7, was nominally about the appropriate use of the summary judgment procedure in Ontario. In fact, the decision ventured more widely into whether the civil justice system could deliver timely and affordable adjudication for ordinary litigants. The system, the Court said, has become...
There is a tension at the heart of the civil justice system. On the one hand, the system exists to resolve disputes on their merits. On the other hand, time limits imposed by the Rules of Civil Procedure or court orders must be respected, otherwise they will cease to have any meaning. Judges are faced...
The latest issue of The Advocates’ Journal has a commentary on the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Hryniak v. Mauldin by Jonathan Lisus. Mr. Lisus asks: “How will litigation history judge the decision – as a requiem for the vanishing trial or as a catalyst for modern trial procedure?” It’s fair to say that...