ICBC Law

In an illustration of a seldom used power, reasons for judgement were released this week by the BC Supreme Court, Victoria Registry, ordering a Plaintiff’s lawyer to pay costs to Defendants personally pursuant to Rule 14-1(33) after bringing an unsuccessful application to renew a lawsuit.

In this week’s case (Drover v. BCE Inc.,) the Plaintiff sued various Defendants challenging system access fees collected by cellular companies.   It was a proposed class action.  The lawsuit was filed in 2004 and various Defendants were served the lawsuit via fax.  Some Defendants questioned the propriety of fax service to which the Plaintiff’s lawyer responded “we believe the Court will accept service by Facsimile“.

No steps were taken to perfect service until 2012 when the matter was brought before the Court with the Plaintiff asking the Court to permit “the plaintiffs to serve the statement of claim”.  The Court refused noting that the Plaintiff’s lawyer “did not bother to consider the relief that might be available under the Rules.  Instead, he seemed to be content with putting a general concept in his application in the hope of attracting the court’s sympathy.”  The Court found this was “unacceptable” and dismissed the application after canvassing the factors under Rule 3-2(1).

Mr. Justice Weatherill awarded multiple Defendants costs and further ordered that the Plaintiff’s lawyer personally pay these.  In doing so the Court provided the following reasons:

[62]         In my view, this is an exceptional case.  The conduct of counsel for the plaintiffs has caused costs to be wasted through delay and neglect.  Plaintiffs’ counsel neglected this action for over 8 years.  When he got around to dealing with it by bringing this application, he failed to set out the proper relief.  Furthermore, the application was not supported by any evidence explaining either the delay or the failure to comply with the Rules regarding the need for an endorsement and proper service.  Moreover, the application was brought against defendants against whom there was no basis for the order(s) sought.  To say that this was and has from the outset been a shoddy piece of counsel work would be an understatement.

[63]         I am ordering that E.F. Anthony Merchant, Q.C. be personally liable for the foregoing awards of costs, payable forthwith.

Tags: bc injury law, Drover v. BCE Inc., Mr. Justice Weatherill, RUle 14, Rule 14-1, Rule 14-1(33), Rule 14-1(33)(c), Rule 3, Rule 3-2, Rule 3-2(1), Section 37 Class Proceedings Act

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 16th, 2013 at 9:11 am and is filed under BC Supreme Court Costs Cases, BCSC Civil Rule 14, BCSC Civil Rule 3. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.