Law Times

Page 16 July 21, 2014 • Law Times www.lawtimesnews.com DA SILVA BECOMES OBA PRESIDENT Ministry of the Attorney General counsel Orlando Da Silva is the new president of the Ontario Bar Association. Da Silva replaces past presi- dent Pascale Daigneault in the role. Da Silva was previously the first vice president of the OBA, a role now filled by Ed- win Upenieks. Elected to the position of second vice president is David Sterns of Sotos LLP. In addition, Scotiabank se- nior legal counsel Lynne Vic- ars becomes the OBA's trea- surer. LAWYER SORRY FOR LEGAL POT AT WORK SEATTLE — You can buy marijuana legally in Washington state, but don't bring it to the office, a lawyer has shown. According to Reuters, Seattle city attorney Pete Holmes has apologized for violating work- place rules by bringing bags of marijuana he pur- chased from newly opened Washington state pot shops back to his office. Holmes was one of the first people in line when the first few marijuana retail shops opened across Washington state where vot- ers in 2012 sanctioned the sale of cannabis to adults for recreational use under a steeply taxed and regulated system. "When I brought the unopened marijuana to city offices — trying to keep up with a busy schedule — I nonetheless violated the city's rules," Holmes said in a statement on the city's web site. "At the end of the business day, I took the mari- juana home and left it there, still unopened, be- fore I participated in the second community walk of the mayor's summer of safety." Holmes apologized, volunteered to donate $3,000 to a downtown homeless shelter, and voiced his ongoing support for the state's land- mark initiative. Earlier that week, Holmes held up a brown paper bag carrying marijuana he had bought minutes before at Seattle's first pot shop for a sea of journalists. "The most important take away here is that today marijuana sales became legal and I'm here to personally exercise myself this new freedom," Holmes told the media. The drugs-at-work violation ref lects a thorny reality for users in Washington state as the U.S. government still considers marijuana illegal and Holmes said in his statement that Seattle is a "drug-free workplace" under federal law. "Not only are controlled substances (like marijuana) banned from city offices, city employees cannot possess them while on city business," Holmes wrote in his statement. LEGAL QUAGMIRE OVER FIRED NANNY LOS ANGELES — Is the case of a fired nanny who refused to leave her employer's home an employment law or a tenancy matter? Either way, a California family is in a quagmire after a 64-year-old woman they hired as a live-in nan- ny stopped working and has refused to move out of their home. Marcella Bracamonte said she and her hus- band, Ralph, hired Diane Stretton in early March to do chores and watch over their children in ex- change for room and board in their home in Up- land, Calif., in the Los Angeles area. About three weeks later, however, Stretton stopped working, saying she had a chronic pul- monary disease, and ignored repeated requests to leave the house, Bracamonte said. She added that the woman also threatened to sue the family for wrongful termination and elder abuse. "I am very frustrated and very upset. She'd stay in her room 90 per cent of the day," Bra- camonte told Reuters. "She was never there to help prepare a meal but was always there to eat the meal, and that was really the only time I would see her." Police have declined to intervene in a civil matter, Bracamonte said, so the family has start- ed a formal eviction process that they fear could take months. An Upland police official declined to com- ment on the case but said that once a person establishes residency, they must be "formally evicted" under California law, a process that could lead to a court-ordered forcible eviction carried out by county sheriff 's deputies. According to Reuters, Stretton's name appears on California's so-called vexatious litigant lists. "I am scared because she knows the law so well. I am scared that, in this whole fiasco, we are going to get hurt," said Bracamonte. LT The title insurer that puts you front row, centre Putting the legal community front and centre has made us the #1 choice with Canadian lawyers for over a decade. Stewart Title does not support programs that reduce or eliminate the lawyer's role in real estate transactions. For more information call (888) 667-5151 or visit www.stewart.ca. Untitled-2 1 7/19/11 12:31:45 PM u Bizarre Briefs By Viola James u The InsIde story COSTS ORDER AGAINST COUNSEL FOR TEMPLE A Superior Court judge has ordered a lawyer to personally pay costs for furbishing "un- founded allegations" against the plaintiff in a case. In 1250294 Ontario Ltd. v. 2141065 Ontario Inc., the plaintiff, lawyer Ben Martin, had brought a summary judg- ment motion for foreclosure of a Sikh temple on his property in Brampton, Ont. The judge granted the summary judgment motion and dismissed the de- fendants' counterclaim. During the summary judg- ment motion, the defendants' counsel, Doug LaFramboise, caused unnecessary waste of resources, the court found, and ordered the lawyer to jointly or severally pay the $79,000 in costs awarded against his clients. "The record for the mo- tion establishes that it was Mr. LaFramboise who was the mas- termind of the congregation's corporation's factual and legally untenable defence strategy that included serious and ultimately unfounded allegations of fraud and impropriety by Mr. Martin, including an allegation that Mr. Martin, who is an officer of this court, had misled and deceived the court," wrote Justice Paul Perell in his July 8 reasons for his decision on costs. He added: "In the case at bar, Mr. LaFramboise fashioned a defence for his client that was untenable and that falsely ma- ligned the professional reputa- tion of Mr. Martin. Absent an explanation from Mr. LaFram- boise, this is an appropriate case to make him personally responsible for the costs of the proceedings in the amount of $79,021.50, all inclusive." RARE MALICIOUS PROSECUTION CASE In an unusual decision, the On- tario Superior Court of Jus- tice has awarded damages to a man in a malicious prosecution case where the defendant was a witness instead of police or the Crown. Drainville v. Vilchez is an un- common example of a success- ful malicious prosecution suit against a private individual. "Normally, the person or en- tity against whom a malicious prosecution suit is brought is the police or the Crown," wrote Jus- tice Peter Howden on July 4. "There are rare cases like this one where the complainant has been the defendant, without cre- ating even a ripple on the surface of the lake of analytic discipline." Plaintiff Denis Drainville had been criminally charged and subsequently acquitted of mischief and dangerous driving. The person who had reported him to the police, Mario Vil- chez, was the target of the mali- cious prosecution suit. Vilchez lied to police about Drainville hitting him with his vehicle at a gas station in 2011 when, in fact, he had put his legs in contact with Drainville's front bumper, the judge found. The court ordered Vilchez to pay Drainville $23,866.37 for legal fees and the additional rent payment the plaintiff incurred because of the original criminal charges. "He lied to the police know- ing that a criminal prosecution against Mr. Drainville would follow," wrote Howden. LT "Heads, this firm will accept digital currency as payment. Tails, it won't. Anything else, it'll wait until the class actions against bitcoin exchanges have clarified the situation." David Sterns

• Cover