Law Times

lAw Times • April 20, 2009 NEWS Peel justice of the peace under fire BY ROBERT TODD Law Times A Peel-based justice of the peace is again under the spotlight, this time fac- ing allegations of inappropri- ately touching a fellow JP "in a sexual manner." Vernon Chang Alloy will go before a public hearing headed by Justice William Gorewich of the Ontario Court of Justice on May 11 to face a pair of allega- tions. Gorewich will consider whether, in June 2006, Chang Alloy "made unwanted physi- cal contact with another justice of the peace by inappropriately touching her in a sexual man- ner, and later told her that he checks his work schedule to see when she is working and that he had never checked his schedule like that before." The inquiry also will consider whether, in July 2006, he "made unwanted physical contact with the other justice of the peace by inappropriately touching her in a sexual manner." Gorewich must decide wheth- er a recommendation should be made to the lieutenant-governor in council to remove Chang Al- loy from office, or whether the Justices of the Peace Review Council should issue him a warning, reprimand him, order an apology, require rehabilita- tion, or issue a suspension. According to public salary disclosure records, Chang Alloy received a salary of $107,469 in 2007. Gavin MacKenzie and Jaya- shree Goswami, a partner and lawyer with Heenan Blaikie LLP, respectively, have been named commission counsel. Mississauga lawyer Eugene Bhattacharya is representing Chang Alloy. "He's got a great reputation for public service, and he's look- ing forward to dealing with this matter in a public forum, and getting it resolved and putting it behind him," said Bhattacharya. "There's a dispute as to the facts, and that's why we're having an inquiry." Chang Alloy continues to hear cases despite the pending public hearing, he says. Bhattacharya says the Justices of the Peace Act allows for mat- ters to be resolved through an agreement between parties, but due to the "nature of the allega- tions" Chang Alloy faces, this matter must be handled through the inquiry process. Chang Alloy, who has been a JP for 19 years hearing cases throughout the central-west re- gion, was at the centre of con- troversy over an August 2008 ruling from Superior Court Jus- tice Bonnie Wein. She criticized and overturned his decision to "take a flier" and release — on recognizance with terms — a man charged with weapons and drug trafficking offences. Upon issuing his verbal reasons, Chang Alloy said, "I think I'm going to take a flier and I suppose I will hear if I do Untitled-4 1 if I take the flier and it blows up in my face, but this is why they pay me the little bucks to take these fliers," according to Wein's decision. The Superior Court judge said Chang Alloy's reasons "flow like a meandering stream of consciousness, with the sud- den and surprising result jut- ting out like an abrupt and un- expected rock." She found that Chang Al- "most egregious" loy's were: errors "(i) the failure to refer to or comment on the primary ground; (ii) the failure to ar- ticulate or relate the evidence to the secondary ground; (iii) the apparent adoption of a person- alized test of taking a gamble with an expressed concern that it might reflect badly on the justice of the peace, rather than assessing the risk to the public; (iv) a misapprehension concern- ing the impact and application of recent legislative changes; (v) the failure to articulate the tertiary ground as recently amended or relate the evidence to that ground; (vi) the failure to accurately reflect the strin- gent conditions, which even the defence acknowledged was nec- essary, in the statement of terms of release and in the subsequent wording of the terms of the re- cognizance." Wein acknowledged that Chang Alloy couldn't have been expected to deliver oral reasons "to a standard of perfection." She said, "Colloquialisms used in oral reasons are not nec- essarily inappropriate, but in a serious matter involving the possession of cocaine in circum- stances that indicate trafficking, the possession of a loaded gun, and the pointing of a firearm, a clear statement of the burden of proof and a clear analysis is required." LT PAGE 5 And don't call it Vangroovy either A Toronto lawyer's lack of understanding of British Columbia geog- raphy has caused a non-compete clause to be deemed invalid, says the Supreme Court of Canada. The term "Metropolitan City of Vancouver," was part of an employ- ment contract, yet it is not a legally recognized distinction of B.C.'s largest city and metropolitan area, said the court in a written judgment. "The original restrictive covenant was drafted by a Toronto lawyer who apparently did not know that 'Metropolitan City of Vancouver' was not a legally defined term," wrote Justice Marshall Rothstein in Shafron v. KRG Insurance Brokers (Western) Inc. It seems KRG had used the geographical reference as part of a non-com- pete clause in an employment contract with insurance broker Morley Sha- fron. When Shafron left the company and began work with an insurance company in Richmond, a part of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, KRG sued. Despite the Torontonian's apparent gaffe, western alienation theorists may want to hold off on criticizing lawyers from the "Centre of the Universe." It seems while Rothstein, originally from Winnipeg, had a problem with the incorrect term, the B.C. Court of Appeal did not. The appeal court originally allowed KRG's claim defining "Metropoli- tan City of Vancouver" as an area including Vancouver, the University of British Columbia endowment lands, Burnaby, and Richmond. The Supreme Court refused to accept the appeal court's definition or to amend, or "blue pencil," the agreement by simply removing "metropoli- tan" from the geographical name. "Rectification is used to restore what the parties' agreement actually was, were it not for the error in the written agreement," says the Supreme Court ruling. "In the present case, there is no indication that the parties agreed on something and then mistakenly included something else in the written contract. Rather, they used an ambiguous term in the written contract." — Kelly Harris With The McKellar Structured Settlement™ The McKellar Structured Settlement is a sure thing. Tax-free. Guaranteed. Billions of dollars invested, not a penny lost. www.mckellar.com 1-800-265-8381 www.lawtimesnews.com 3/31/09 11:32:42 AM

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• Fight Over Fees
• Financial Matters
• Focus On ADR/Mediation