News & Other Media Clippings about Canada's Legal System
Introduction
Information
- Canada's Courts in the News
- Lawyers & Law Firms in the News
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This collection of clippings is from newspapers and other media about Canadian courts, court cases, lawyers,
and other events reported in regional, national and international publications about Canada's evolving legal landscape.
| Supreme Court of Canada
| Class Action Lawyers Fees Dispute
| Class Action Drug Suits
| Class Action & Merrill Lynch
| Sex Abuse Class Action
| Body Tissue Transplants
| Tainted Blood Criminal Trial
| Canadian defamation laws & Internet media
| Medical Hospital Study |
2016 Actions / Seeking Certification Eg.: Seidel v. Telus · McPherson and Gard v. Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche
Fight over [class action lawyers] fees not expected to delay residential schools [claims] cheques: [according to
Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice] cited from Canadian Press Thursday, February 01, 2007 Canada.com
"
OTTAWA (CP) - Canada's Indian affairs minister says a dispute over legal fees is not expected to delay payments to former students of native residential schools.
Ottawa is challenging a court ruling that ordered the government to pay Saskatchewan lawyer Tony Merchant between $25 million and $40 million. Merchant says his firm is owed the money for work done over 10 years on behalf of more than 8,000 natives claiming abuse at residential schools during the last century.
But Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice says the law firm must show evidence that those clients exist and were served.
The dispute has some claimants worried that compensation worth about $5 billion will be delayed.
Prentice says there's no reason why payments expected by late this year should be held up while legal fees are sorted out. "
[© The Canadian Press 2007 cited from http://www.canada.com your source for breaking news in Canada and the world
]
OFFICIAL "BACKGROUNDER THE RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL SYSTEM"
see also Indian and Northern Affairs Canada / Affaires Indiennes et du Nord Canada - official government of Canada website at www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/gs/schl_e.html
Canada's Class actions - 2007-01-31 Globe & Mail Article by BEPPI CROSARIOL
From Globe and Mail: Business Section on line at http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/class-actions/article1069964/
"For proof that Canada's class-action system is badly broken, consider the not-so-little case of last month's residential schools settlement.
While it secured the promise of billions in restitution for thousands of aboriginals who were displaced from their communities to attend the controversial government-run institutions, the ungainly litigation dragged on for a decade across six provinces and three territories, and resulted in an army of lawyers claiming $100-million in legal fees as part of the settlement.
"There's got to be a better way than lugging all those lawyers and all those briefcases to that many different courts," said Ward Branch, a partner with Vancouver-based litigation firm Branch MacMaster [see BranMac.com. "There were plaintiffs' lawyers in every jurisdiction. Everyone wanted their court to have a say, and that resulted in many duplicative efforts. It could have been avoided if we had had a national system in place from the outset."
Mr. Branch and a growing chorus of peers in the litigation world say the case underscored a fundamental contradiction in Canada's class-action system. On one hand, class actions are designed to curb excessive litigation by letting a single representative plaintiff advance the claims of many. But in Canada, those actions come under provincial and territorial jurisdiction, meaning various overlapping claims can -- and often do -- proceed simultaneously across the country.
...
The result:&nbsol Courts become cluttered with virtually identical cases, many plaintiffs face the quandary of having to choose which jurisdiction in which to cast their lot, and defendants are forced to fight duplicate battles on multiple fronts.
..... go to GlobeandMail.com for original complete article and related news ... above citation made February 01, 2007
- 2007 CLASS ACTION CERTIFICATION NEWS
"BC court approves suit against Merrill Lynch Canada 2006-12-28 19:20:00
VANCOUVER (CP) - A B.C. Supreme Court judge has approved a class action lawsuit against Merrill Lynch Canada over claims the investment house made secret profits on foreign currency exchange rates charged for securities transactions."
"Investor Russell Cooper alleges Merrill Lynch did not disclose to its clients in the 1990s that it was charging a spread of as much as 2.5 per cent trades involving mostly U.S.-denominated foreign securities destined for Canadian-dollar accounts."
[cited from www.canoe.ca, references also in GlobeandMail.com]
Contact Bruce Lemer, plaintiffs' counsel,
for more information at blemer@gkn.ca
- For web profile of Bruce Lemer see www.lawyers-bc.com/classactions/
2006 April - 45 days left for former Vancouver Sea Cadets to join in Sexual Abuse Class Action Settlement
- see Globe and Mail News Article "After decades of silence, former sea cadet speaks out about sexual abuse: 'It was a den of iniquity'" by
Peter Kennedy, Vancouver BC... [GlobeandMail.com
& Victoira, Times Colonist Saturday, April 08, 2006 p.D6 [CanWest News Service]
"...Anyone sexually abused while attending sea cadets in Vancouver's Stanley Park between 1964 and 1980 has 45 days to join a class-action lawsuit settlement, which has set aside almost $2 million for future claimants.
".... there's $1.8 million set aside" said lawyer Robert Gibbens, involved in the $10-millin settlement for 35 known victims..... "Clearly, there are [others] and they've got 45 days. They won't have a second channce."
"Victims who haven't previously come forward are asked to contact Gibbens by phone at 9604) 682-3871 or by email..." [care of www.laxtonco.com]
2006 March 2 - Lawyer, Greg Monforton, "files class action on behalf of transplant patients who allegedly received illegally harvested tissue and bone"
TORONTO, March 22 /CNW/ - Greg Monforton, President-Elect of the Ontario
Trial Lawyers Association (http://www.gregmonforton.com) today announced that
his firm has filed a 210 million dollar class action lawsuit in connection
with illegally harvested and unscreened human tissue and bone used in
transplant surgery.
Monforton is working on the case together with co-counsel Motley Rice,
LLC of Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina.
The suit, filed in Windsor, Ontario, names Clarence Renaud as
representative plaintiff of the proposed class of plaintiffs. Mr. Renaud
allegedly received illegally harvested and unscreened bone and tissue as part
of a routine back surgery at Hotel-Dieu Grace Hospital in Windsor on April 27,
2003.
Defendants in the case include allograft (grafts of human tissue)
distributors Zimmer Dental Medical Incorporated, Biogenics Inc., Medtronic of
Canada Ltd., and the now defunct Biomedical Tissue Services Ltd. ("BTS"),
along with two of its founders....
[cited from NewsWire.ca English Services go there for full press release
2006 February 06 - Criminal Trial Begins for former medical head of Canadian Red Cross
"
Feb. 6, 2006:
Dr. Roger Perrault goes on trial in Toronto on charges of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and criminal nuisance endangering the public. The trial of the former medical head of the Canadian Red Cross"
[from 2005.02.07 www.cbc.ca/news/background/
taintedblood/bloodscandal_timeline.html ]
Legal wrangling delays tainted blood trial
Updated Mon. Feb. 6 2006 11:30 PM ET CTV.ca News Staff
"...
Dr. Roger Perrault, former national medical director of the Canadian Red Cross, did not attend his proceedings on Monday but his defence lawyers were on the attack.
They accused the Crown of not providing full disclosure on its roster of expert witnesses, CP reported.
The lawyers also opposed a move to add 46 witnesses to the list.
'This is a criminal trial, this is not a public inquiry,' Brian Greenspan, lawyer for Armour Pharmaceutical Co., said in court. ...."
[go to www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/
CTVNews/20060205/
blood_scandal_060205/20060206?hub=Canada for full storey - above quoted from web site 2006.02.07]
2004 - "1st test of Canada's anti-terrorism laws by Supreme Court of Canada"
- Subject-Contents
"The Supreme Court of Canada in a first test of Canada's anti-terrorism laws,
has ruled that the heightened threat after 9/11 does not necessarily justify
secret court hearings to try to root out terrorist plots.....
The Vancouver Sun launched the court challenge after being denied
entry to a hearing that was connected to the Air India bombing trial and
was being conducted in utmost secrecy in a Vancouver courtroom....
"
- Author(s): Janice Tibbetts (Ottawa)
- Source: Front page A1 print version of newspaper
- Media: The Vancouver Sun
- Date originally published: June 24, 2004, Thursday
- City & province: published in Vancouver, BC, Canada
- see also
web site: www.vancouversun.com
2004 - "Crown wins Air India fight in Supreme Court"
- Subject-Contents: test of Canada anti-terrorism law
"
The Vancouver Sun Appellant
v.
Attorney General of Canada,
Attorney General of British Columbia,
"The Named Person , Ajaib Singh Bagri and
Ripudaman Singh Malik Respondents
and
Attorney General of Ontario Intervener
Indexed as: Vancouver Sun (Re)
| Neutral citation: 2004 SCC 43.
| File No.: 29878.
| 2003: December 10; 2004: June 23."
"
ON APPEAL FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
Criminal law -- Terrorism -- Investigative hearings -- Open court principle -- Level of secrecy applicable to judicial investigative hearing proceedings -- Whether Crown's application for order for investigative hearing properly heard in camera -- Whether existence of order for investigative hearing ought to have been secret -- Whether hearing for determining constitutional validity of investigative hearing provision and validity of order for investigative hearing should have been conducted in camera -- Whether investigative hearing must be held in camera -- Applicability of Dagenais/Mentuck test -- Criminal Code, R.S.C. 1985, c. C-46, s. 83.28.
"
[The appeal] was "Held [emphasis added] (Bastarache and Deschamps JJ. dissenting in part): The appeal should be allowed in part and the order made by the hearing judge varied. ..."
The text of the ruling is available at link to Supreme Court Reports online archives.
[quote 040704 from www.lexum.umontreal.ca see link below]
2003-2004 - Canadian defamation laws & Internet media
Ontario Court issues injunction against Internet defamation
Barrick Gold Corporation v. Lopehandia "confirms that Canadian defamation laws,
which were developed in the context of more traditional media, apply to Internet defamation and can be used to obtain meaningful remedies against persons publishing defamatory statements on the Internet. More generally, the case demonstrates that Canadian courts are willing
to adapt traditional legal principles to respond to the exigencies of the Internet."
[quote fr.
Bradley J. Freedman in BC Continuing Legal Education Society website 2004.07.17]
see also
http://www.canlii.org/on/cas/onca/
2004/2004onca10786.html copy of court records cited below
[at Canadian Legal Information Institute : Ontario >> Court of Appeal for Ontario]
DATE: 20040604 DOCKET: C39837
COURT OF APPEAL FOR ONTARIO
DOHERTY, LASKIN AND BLAIR JJ.A.
BETWEEN:
BARRICK GOLD CORPORATION Plaintiff (Appellant)
- and -
JORGE LOPEHANDIA and CHILE MINERAL FIELDS CANADA LTD. Defendants (Respondents)
Class Action News Clippings
2004 - "Baycol drug case settlement set: Lawyers reached a deal on the cholesterol drug class action suit."
- Subject-Contents: class action lawsuit against the pharmaceutical company Bayer
"TORONTO -- Canadians who allege they became sick after taking the cholesterol-lowering
drug Baycol have reached a tentative settlement in their class action lawsuit against
the pharmaceutical giant Bayer. Toronto lawyers said yesterday they have reached a proposed settlement on behalf of plaintiffs across the country who contracted the muscle disease rhabdomyolysis after taking the drug.
'It applies to individuals who ingested Baycol and subsequently, as a result of that developed . . . rhabdomyolysis or kidney
disease and, in certain cases, death,' said Toronto lawyer Joel Rochon.'
" [excerpt quoted from www.canoe.ca (see below for link) 040704]
- Author(s): PAUL CROSS, CP
- Source: London Free Press [Ontario]
- Media: newspaper print and online at Canoe.ca
- Date originally published: 2004-03-19
- City & province: Toronto
- see also
web site: www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/
LondonFreePress article full version online
-
see also profile of plaintiff's class action lawyer Joel Rachon at
www.rochongenova.com/joel.html
2003 - "Diet pill lawsuit settled"
- Subject-Contents: class action lawsuit against pharmaceutical/drug-manufacturing company
"
TORONTO - An agreement has been reached in a Canadian class-action lawsuit against
the maker and distributor of two diet pills. The suit involves more than 155,000 people
who used Ponderal and Redux -- also known by their generic names flenfluramine and dexfenfluramine.
They've now been linked to a range of heart and lung diseases.
The pills were pulled off the market in September 1997.
'It's a major step in proceeding towards compensating those who developed primary pulmonary hypertension (PPH) or heart disease,' said Vincent Genova, a lawyer representing the complainants.
The settlement with French pharmaceutical company Biofarma and Servier Canada, the distributor, is still subject to court approval. ...
" [quoted 040704 fr. CBC web site see below for link
|
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Medical Malpractice & Professional Negligence: An Overview - Vancouver, B.C.
www.brucelemer.com/medical-malpractice/overview
Canada's Health Care System - Studies
" 'Explosive' study: medical errors kill 24,000 a year"
- Subject-Contents:
"As many as 24,000 patients dies in Canadian hospitals each year,
while tens of thousands
more are crippled, injured or poisoned in association
with medical errors that could have been prevented....
A ... study of 20 hospitals in five provinces ... found one in 13 patients suffers an adverse event, more than double the rate found in studies of U.S. hospitals.
The study, published today in the Canadian Medical
Association Journal [see abstract] found 185,000 patients a year suffer adverse events.....
[events] included drug overdoses, botched diagnoses, ...
Researchers say 37% of events could have been prevented,
noting Canada lags behind the United States and other countries
in confronting medical errors....
"
- Author: Brad Evenson
- Source: National Post
- Media: national newspaper
- Date originally published: May 22, 2004, Saturday Vol. 5 No.176 p.1 front page
- City & province: Don Mills, Ontario
- see also
web site: www.nationalpost.com
Research Study cited above is titled "The Canadian Adverse Events Study: the incidence of adverse events among hospital patients in Canada"
[Authors included]
G. Ross Baker, Peter G. Norton, Virginia Flintoft, Régis Blais, Adalsteinn Brown, Jafna Cox, Ed Etchells, William A. Ghali, Philip Hébert, Sumit R. Majumdar, Maeve O'Beirne, Luz Palacios-Derflingher, Robert J. Reid, Sam Sheps and Robyn Tamblyn
From the Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation (Baker, Flintoft, Brown) and of Medicine (Etchells, Hébert), University of Toronto, Toronto, Ont.; the Department of Family Medicine (Norton, O'Beirne, Palacios-Derflingher), Medicine and Community Health Sciences (Ghali), and the Centre for Health and Policy Studies (Ghali), University of Calgary, Calgary, Alta.; the Department of Health Administration, Université de Montréal, Montréal, Que. (Blais); the Division of Cardiology, Departments of Medicine and of Community Health and Epidemiology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS (Cox); the Division of General Internal Medicine and Patient Safety Service (Etchells), and the Department of Family Medicine (Hébert), Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ont.; the Department of Medicine, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alta. (Majumdar); the Center for Health Studies, Group Health Cooperative, Seattle, Wash. (Reid); the Department of Health Care Epidemiology and the Western Regional Training Centre for Health Services Research, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC (Sheps); and the Departments of Medicine and of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, McGill University, Montréal, Que. (Tamblyn)
The abstract and full text version of the this study is availabe at the web site of the
of the Canadian Medical Association Journal online at
www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/
abstract/170/11/1678
Medical Malpractice Lawyers - Vancouver, B.C.
www.brucelemer.com/medical-malpractice/overview
Reference & Background Articles
see also Canada Class Actions news updates
2001 - "Victims applaud as charges are laid RCMP probe fingers bureaucrats, U.S. company, Red Cross
"
- Subject-Contents: [tainted blood products criminal charges]
"
Two former Health Canada officials and a former senior member of the
Canadian Red Cross could face up to 10 years in prison if convicted of charges laid by the RCMP in connection with the tainted-blood scandal of the 1980s.
The RCMP announced the results of its five-year investigation yesterday
by revealing that not only have those individuals been charged, but that charges
have also been laid against the Canadian Red Cross Society, which was stripped by
governments of its blood-collecting responsibilities in 1998 and now does other work.
As well, charges have been laid against Armour Pharmaceutical Co., a U.S. firm that produced blood products, and one of its former senior executives.
Tainted-blood victims applauded the announcement.
" [quoted from www.canoe.ca web site 040705 see link below for rest of article]
- Author: Mark Kennedy
- Source: www.canoe.ca/Health0101/29_blood-cp.html
- Media: article in
Ottawa Citizen newspaper, with files from The Canadian Press
- Date originally published: Thursday, November 21, 2002
- City & province: Ottawa, Ontario
- see also
web site: January 29, 2001 news article "Red Cross tainted-blood settlement still faces hurdles"
by DENNIS BUECKERT -- The Canadian Press, archived at www.canoe.ca
- see also Profile of Bruce Lemer,
plaintiff's co-counsel in Endean vs. Canadian Red Cross and others,
... a BC class action on behalf of individuals infected with hepatitis C through blood transfusions, which resulted in the largest class action settlement in Canadian history.
[over $1.5 Billion Cdn.
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