A year ago, a $125 million lawsuit was filed in Ontario against various employers whom had forced people out of their jobs. This stemmed from the Fall 2021 injection mandates across Canadian Provinces and elsewhere. It made headlines across Canadian media outlets.
Interestingly, the case wasn’t filed until March 2023, nearly 18 months after the mandates came into effect. Clearly, this wasn’t urgent at all. And when it eventually was filed, it sat dormant for another year. This gem came from “Mr. Bad Beyond Argument”, and was written in an incomprehensible and unintelligible manner.
Keep in mind, Section 4 of the Ontario Limitations Act sets the time limit (for most things) at 2 years. Since so much time has elapsed, there will be no second opportunity. If this case falls through, that’s it.
Of course, this case never stood a chance. See the previous review on it. There were a litany of basic errors made that ensured it. These include:
- Recycling Statement of Claim from earlier struck cases
- Including content in a CIVIL Claim for which there’s no jurisdiction
- Drafting the Claim in a way that’s incoherent and incomprehensible
- Involving union/Government workers who are barred by arbitration requirements
- Unnecessary delay, causing issues with the Statute of Limitations
- Suing a needless amount of people, driving up costs
It’s this last point that’s of particular interest in this development.
Original retainer was $1,500 each Plaintiff, to cover all
According to the retainer agreement that’s freely available, each of the Plaintiffs would be expected to pay $1,500. While this sounds low, keep in mind that there were supposed to be 100 or more litigants. This would put the total at around $150,000.
That sounds like a reasonable amount, if the case were ever to get to Trial. However, this one never would, for a variety of reasons.
What kind of idiot sues this many unrelated parties?
Twenty (20) different towns, cities and municipalities are being sued. Each is run independently, and presumably, each will end up getting their own lawyer. And this should be obvious, but lawyers are expensive. Even poor and incompetent ones want lots of money.
Considering that the injection mandates were a Provincial dictate, the Plaintiffs could have sued the Ontario Government, and left it at that. However, the moron who compiled this case decided to sue everyone under the sun, even when Plaintiffs had no connection.
- HIS MAJESITY THE KING
- Solicitor General of Ontario
- Town of Ajax
- Town of Ajax Fire Department (Fire Chief Aaron Burridge) City of Cambridge
- City of Cambridge Fire Department (Fire Chief Brian Arnold)
- City of Greater Sudbury
- City of Guelph, City of Guelph Fire Department (Fire Chief Dave Elloway)
- City of Hamilton
- City of Hamilton Police
- City of Hamilton Police Chief (Frank Bergen)
- City of Hamilton Fire Department (Fire Chief David Cunliffe)
- City of Markham
- City of Markham Fire Department (Fire Chief Adam J. Grant)
- City of Mississauga
- City of Mississauga Fire Department (Fire Chief Deryn Rizzi)
- City of Ottawa
- City of Ottawa Police
- City of Ottawa Police Chief (Eric Stubbs)
- City of Ottawa Fire Department (Fire Chief Paul Hutt)
- City of Pickering
- City of Pickering Fire Department (Fire Chief Steve Boyd)
- City of Toronto
- City of Toronto Police
- City of Toronto Chief of Police (James Ramer)
- City of Toronto Fire Service (Fire Chief Matthew Pegg)
- Toronto District School Board
- Toronto Transit Commission
- Toronto Transit Commission Chair (Jon Burnside)
- City of Windsor
- City of Windsor Fire Department (Fire Chief Stephen Laforet)
- Town of Orangeville
- City of St. Catharines
- Regional Municipality of Durham
- York Region
- York Regional Police
- York Regional Police Chief (Jim MacSween)
- City of Niagara Falls
- Niagara Regional Police
- Niagara Regional Police Chief (Bryan MacCulloch)
- Town of Oakville
- Town of Oakville Fire Department (Fire Chief Paul Boissonneault)
- Peel Region
- Peel Regional Police
- Peel Regional Police Chief (Nishan Duraiappah)
- Town of Whitby
- Town of Whitby Fire Department (Fire Chief Mike Hickey)
- Municipality of Leamington
It would be one thing if lawsuit named several officials in a Federal or Provincial Government. They’d all be lumped together, and likely represented together. But here, completely different towns and cities are being sued, some on behalf of a single Plaintiff. This is not a good approach.
There’s also the significant issue that it’s not clear who many of the parties are. Given how poorly worded it is, this can be left open to interpretation.
Take Ottawa, for example. The lawsuit names: (a) City of Ottawa; (b) City of Ottawa Police; and (c) City of Ottawa Police Chief (Eric Stubbs). This is clearly talking about 3 different parties.
However, others like Oakville list: (a) Town of Oakville; and (b) Town of Oakville Fire Department (Fire Chief Paul Boissonneault). It’s not clear if the Fire Department itself if being named, or whether Fire Chief Paul Boissonneault is, and it’s just listing his title.
Similarly with “City of Pickering Fire Department (Fire Chief Steve Boyd)”, and “City of Windsor Fire Department (Fire Chief Stephen Laforet)”, are the Fire Departments themselves being named, or the actual Chiefs? There are several of these instances where it’s not clear who is being named.
On the subject of not knowing who people are: the lawsuit includes several “John Does”. This is complete nonsense. If a person is going to Court asking for money, they need to identify themselves. This is repeated from the Vaccine Choice Canada, Action4Canada, and Adelberg cases.
In short, dozens of separate potential lawsuits were joined into one. Since each jurisdiction ended up getting their own counsel, costs would inevitably skyrocket. And it led to this:
Another $4,500 from each, $450,000 in total to cover costs
November 24, 2023, this letter was sent to the Plaintiffs, demanding another $4,500 each, or else the case would be discontinued. In other words, their lawyer was threatening to pull the plug unless more money was handed over.
According to the letter, there were already 22 different lawyers on retainer for the various Defendants. It’s fair to assume that each would be asking for costs if they were able to get the case thrown out. Courts typically do award costs to successful parties.
$1,500 each became $6,000 really fast.
This is the bait-and-switch that was pulled on the Plaintiffs.
Because there were so many Defendants sued, and now so many lawyers, there would likely be dozens of Motions to Strike (or for Summary Judgement). It’s entirely possible that the total cost award — when the case was thrown out — would amount to thousands of dollars against each Plaintiff. Supposedly this extra half million (or so) would be put in trust to pay off the anticipated cost awards.
Not only that, the lawyer handling the file never tried to defend it. Instead, he held their case hostage, quadrupling the original price. Of course, the the lawsuit would still have been tossed anyway. Given the fact that the Plaintiffs were Government and/or unionized workers, they’d have no jurisdiction to sue in Court. Even without that, the Claim would, in any event, have to be rewritten in a coherent manner.
The letter cites a January 24th, 2024 case conference, to set dates for a Summary Judgement Motion. Presumably, the Defendants want the case thrown out for lack of jurisdiction. Remember, employees of unionized workplaces typically have the right to grieve and to arbitrate, but not to litigate.
For reference: the January 24th hearing did happen, but it was adjourned indefinitely. As of now, there are currently no dates set for anything.
There is an alternate theory on why this demand letter came. Given that the Ontario First Responders Claim is essentially a cut-and-paste of the Adelberg (Federal) case, it’s entirely possible that the lawyer himself would have been personally on the hook. He just recycles his Claims, makes cosmetic changes, and refiles them.
A deadline of December 17th, 2023 was given to vote. According to a source within, the group voted on whether or not to pay the extra money. The answer was overwhelmingly “no”. This meant they weren’t willing to give in to blackmail.
If a Notice of Discontinuance is filed, it amounts to dropping the case. And given how much time has passed, none of the litigants will be able to seek further recourse.
It seems unlikely that any refunds will be issued, regardless of what a dumpster fire this suit was from the beginning.
Statement of Claim didn’t follow Rules of Civil Procedure anyway
The Action4Canada, Vaccine Choice Canada and Adelberg (Federal) cases were all critiqued a long time ago. None of these Statement of Claims, all drafted by the same person, followed the basics of Civil Procedure. Whether in British Columbia, Ontario, or the Federal Court, there are certain minimum standards everyone needs to meet.
The documents were so incoherent, that even a person without a background in law could see that there would be serious problems.
Action4Canada and Adelberg were both struck as “bad beyond argument”. These were in August 2022 and February 2023, respectively. This was before the First Responders case was filed.
Adelberg had the additional problem that most of the Plaintiffs were barred from suing because of legislation that mandated a grievance process. Again, that ruling came out before this one was filed.
It was reported in January 2023 that the Police On Guard and Children’s Health Defense (Canada) cases had been dormant since their initial filings nearly 2 years before. Again, this was before the First Responders case. How many warning signs are needed?
$150,000 was thrown away on a case designed to go nowhere. None of the Plaintiffs will ever get their day in Court over this. What a waste.
A comment about the group that organized this case, Take Action Canada:
Over 2 years later, this nonsense is still posted their website. They actually gloat about this site getting sued for warning about the dangers of these scam lawsuits. Sandra Sable, who apparently runs T.A.C., even gave an Affidavit in support of a similar intimidation lawsuit against CSASPP and their leadership. She complains that the criticism of other cases — like A4C/VCC — led to potential Plaintiffs dropping out en masse. Apparently, it caused her endless headaches, and threatened the viability of the suit itself, which is probably true. In other words, Sable was fully aware of what she was signing onto, and did it anyway.
The irony: if Sable and T.A.C. had taken these warnings to heart, Plaintiffs in the First Responders case wouldn’t have been taken advantage of like this. Plenty of former clients saw what was going on. But some people are immune to good advice.
Since the Plaintiffs were will never get justice for their cases, perhaps they can start filing malpractice lawsuits, and get the insurance money. Gill and Lamba have clearly learned how this works.
T.A.C. DOCUMENTS/LINKS TO LOOK AT
(1) https://takeactioncanada.ca/
(2) https://twitter.com/Takeactioncan
(3) Ontario EMS Retainer Agreement – $1,500 Each Plaintiff
(4) Ontario EMS Statement Of Claim
(5) Ontario EMS Amended Statement Of Claim
(6) Ontario EMS Requisition To Amend
(7) Ontario EMS Notice Of Intent To Defend
(8) Ontario EMS Demand For More Money
T.A.C. POSTS SURVEY ABOUT DISCONTINUING “FIRST RESPONDERS” LAWSUIT
(1) https://takeactioncanada.ca/tac911-legal-action-1st-responder-essential-workers-update-dec-survey/
(2) Take Action Canada — Legal Action 1st Responder Essential Workers Update Dec Survey
(3) Wayback Machine Archive
(4) https://canucklaw.ca/wp-content/uploads/Ontario-EMS-Demand-For-More-Money.pdf
MEDIA COVERING INITIAL FILING
(1) https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/former-municipal-employees-launch-125m-lawsuit-over-vaccine-mandates-1.6298453
(2) https://www.insauga.com/ex-oakville-hamilton-municipal-workers-part-of-125m-lawsuit-filed-over-vaccine-mandates/
(3) https://www.baytoday.ca/local-news/126m-class-action-vaccine-mandate-lawsuit-launched-6656849
(4) https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-region/covid-19-lawsuit-seeks-125m-from-ontario-municipalities-including-cambridge-fire-department/article_f6ba19fb-7152-590d-9573-2fe81653efd5.html