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Tag: Rule 11-1(2)

Costs Ordered Following "Unnecessary" Defence Case Planning Conference

Written by admin on . Posted in BCSC Civil Rule 11, BCSC Civil Rule 5, Civil Procedure. 45 Comments on Costs Ordered Following "Unnecessary" Defence Case Planning Conference

Reasons for judgement were released today by the BC Supreme Court, Victoria Registry, addressing when Case Planning Conferences are unnecessary and finding that a costs order is appropriate in the face of such a CPC.
In today’s case (Stewart v. Robinson) the Plaintiff was involved in a collision and sued for damages.  The Defendant set down a CPC seeking an order requiring the Plaintiff to reveal the “the areas of expertise” of the experts the Plaintiff would rely on at trial.  The Defendant also sought a few collateral orders such updated lists of documents and timelines for discoveries.  The Court held that the first order was one the Court had no jurisdiction to make and that the further orders were unnecessary given that the Plaintiff was fulfilling their disclosure duties under the Rules of Court.
Master Bouck dismissed the Defendant’s application and in doing so found it was an uncessary hearing and ordered that costs be paid.  In reaching this result the Court provided the following reasons:
[25]         Rule 5-3 (3) requires the court to make a case plan order following a CPC. In my view, that requirement presumes that the CPC served some purpose…
[28]         The plaintiff submits that the sole purpose of the case planning conference was an attempt by the defence to ferret out information about the plaintiff’s experts even though such a purpose is contrary to well-established law. The plaintiff also cites Galvon v. Hopkins, 2011 BCSC 1835, and Amezcua v. Norlander, 2012 BCSC 719 (Master)…
[34]         Read together, the above authorities stand for these propositions:
1.  rules of civil procedure do not trump substantive law, including the principle of litigation privilege;
2.  a party is not required to reveal, in a case plan proposal or order or otherwise, the name of any expert or the area of expertise of any intended expert before the 84-day deadline for the service of expert reports; but
3.  the court may order that the service requirements under Rule 11-6 (3) be abridged such that expert reports are to be served earlier than the 84 days before trial. Such an order will only be made in exceptional cases where a compelling reason for early disclosure is demonstrated.
[35]         While a party may volunteer details of their expert evidence in advance of the 84-day deadline, a CPC is not required for that purpose. The information can simply be provided in correspondence without the necessity of judicial involvement. As the court determined in Dhugha, the omission of the name of an expert or his or her area of expertise from a case plan order does not preclude the admission of that expert evidence at trial.
[36]         Thus, the order sought in the defendant’s case plan proposal with respect to experts could not be made by the court. The order proposed by the defence at the CPC with respect to experts is not necessary.
[37]         That leads to the next question: was a CPC necessary for any other purpose? In my view, it was not.
[38]         An order requiring the parties to exchange further amended lists of documents by certain dates is not necessary. Both counsel acknowledge the duty to provide ongoing document disclosure as required by theSCCR. The suggested deadlines micromanages a case that does not require such management.
[39]         An order requiring delivery of a certain therapist’s records by a specified date is also not required. The plaintiff has volunteered to provide those records.
[40]         An order identifying the timing and length of examinations for discovery is also unnecessary. The parties have agreed to examination dates. The length of these examinations was not seriously in dispute at this conference and did not require judicial management.
[41]         In short, I find that no case plan order ought to or need be made at this time…
[46]         Having already concluded that the CPC was unnecessary, I award the plaintiff costs related to counsel’s preparation and attendance and the conference. Those costs are fixed at $750 all inclusive, not payable forthwith.
 

Case Planning Conferences Cannot be Used "to force a party to identify specific medical experts"

Written by admin on . Posted in BCSC Civil Rule 11, BCSC Civil Rule 5. 51 Comments on Case Planning Conferences Cannot be Used "to force a party to identify specific medical experts"

Reasons for judgment were released today addressing the boundaries of the BC Supreme Court’s power to make orders respecting the identity of expert witnesses at a Case Planning Conference.
In today’s case (Dhunga v. Ukardi) the Defendant set down a Case Planning Conference some 15 months before trial and “sought an order that the plaintiff immediately disclose the areas of expertise of any experts whose evidence will be tendered at trial and an order limiting the expert evidence at trial to those areas of expertise.“.  Mr. Justice Smith rejected this request finding the Court has no jurisdiction to make such an order.  In reaching this conclusion the Court provided the following reasons:
[5] The orders that may be made at a CPC are set out in Rule 5-3(1). The relevant ones for the purpose of these reasons are Rule 5-3(1)(k) and (v):
(1) At a case planning conference, the case planning conference judge or master may make one or more of the following orders in respect of the action, whether or not on the application of a party:
…
(k) respecting experts, including, without limitation, orders
(i) that the expert evidence on any one or more issues be given by one jointly-instructed expert,
(ii) respecting the number of experts a party may call,
(iii) that the parties’ experts must confer before the service of their respective reports,
(iv) setting a date by which an expert’s report must be served on the other parties of record, and
(v) respecting the issues on which an expert may be called;
…
(v) any orders the judge or master considers will further the object of these Supreme Court Civil Rules.
..
[16] As pointed out in Amezcua, Rule 5-3(1)(k) sets out a number of specific orders that may be made in regard to experts, but those do not include an order disclosing an expert’s identity or the area of his or her expertise before the report is served, much less an order barring any additional experts or areas of expertise. If Rule 11-1(2) was intended to refer to such an order, I would have expected to see a corresponding provision in Rule 5-3(1)(k).
[17] I recognize that the list of specific orders in Rule 5-3(1)(k) is stated not to limit the orders that may be made and that Rule 5-3(1)(v) allows for any other orders the judge or master considers will further the object of the rules. However, as was said in Galvon, such general provisions are not sufficient to override basic and clearly established common law rights…
[22] Rule 11-1(2) cannot be used at a CPC to force a party to identify specific medical experts or areas of medical expertise or to limit the party’s case at trial to those experts.
To my knowledge this case is not yet publicly reported but a copy of the reasons can be found here: Dhugha v Ukardi
 

More on Responsive Opinion Evidence Admissibility

Written by admin on . Posted in BCSC Civil Rule 11, Uncategorized. 51 Comments on More on Responsive Opinion Evidence Admissibility

Reasons for judgement were published recently by the BC Supreme Court, Vancouver Registry, addressing responsive expert reports and the discretion of the Court to adjourn a trial to permit late expert evidence to be introduced.
In the recent case (Lennox v. Karim) the Plaintiff was injured in a 2003 collision.   87 days prior to trial the Plaintiff served a medico-legal report diagnosing the Plaintiff with a meniscal tear.  The Defendant obtained a report addressing this injury and served it on the Plaintiff.  This report was served in less than 84 days before trail.  The Plaintiff objected arguing this report was late and that it was not truly responsive.  Mr. Justice Armstrong disagreed and admitted the report finding that it was responsive, and if not, the trial should be adjourned to allow admission of the report to address the relatively late disclosure of the meniscal tear.  The Court provided the following reasons:

[38] In this case, Mr. Lennox failed to alert the defendant to the central issue of a torn meniscus. His pleadings indicated an injury of both knees without any reference in specific to the torn meniscus. This is significant in this case, because the plaintiff was under the obligation to obtain a court order to permit Dr. Stewart to testify and if that order had been applied for, the defendant would have been put on notice at an earlier time as to the issue which became central to this case.

[39] In my view the Leith report, in the words of Smith J., is not a freestanding medical opinion that ought to have been served under Rule 11-6(3). It is in its entirety a responsive opinion directed solely to one opinion of Dr. Stewart relating to the plaintiff’s medical condition, that being the torn meniscus…

[42] If I am wrong in this decision, it would have also been my further opinion that in the circumstances of this case the defendant would have otherwise been entitled to an adjournment of the trial to secure the medical report of Dr. Leith if it was not otherwise admissible under 11-6(4). It seems to me that 11-1(2) is purposely directed at requiring the plaintiff and defendant to avoid the last minute introduction of medical evidence in cases which may have proceeded for many years on a different track or a different theory. I note that neither of the experts described in the CPC report have been or are going to be called as witnesses in this case, but I am not required to deal with that issue.

[43] It seems to me that Dr. Leith’s report can simply be admitted and I can ignore those provisions which in my view are not appropriate.