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Old 09-26-2013, 10:46 AM   #227
troutman
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What has Meads v Meads wrought?

http://ablawg.ca/2013/04/08/what-has...meads-wrought/

Consequences of being an OPCA Litigant?

http://ablawg.ca/2013/05/10/conseque...pca-litigant/#

in Meads (at para 631) Justice Rooke had formulated the following general principle:

[I]nnocent parties [should] be indemnified for the legal costs associated with OPCA litigation. No, or little, cost should flow to a litigant who is abused by OPCA strategies.

In applying this principle in ANB, Justice Rooke awarded the defendants the costs that they asked for, costs that covered the expense of responding to A.N.B.’s Statement of Claim. In the case of the self-represented lawyer who had been appointed to represent A.N.B.’s children — the lawyer apparently named by mistake as no claim was made against her — the indemnity costs were what she calculated she would have earned had she not spent her time responding to A.N.B.’s lawsuit. Costs against A.N.B. totalled $20,000.

The indemnification nature of the cost award in ANB illustrates another point that Justice Rooke made in Meads (at para 638):

It has been this Court’s experience that OPCA gurus do not educate their customers on the purpose and operation of court cost awards. An OPCA litigant may perceive explanation of this mechanism as a threat, but this explanation is a crucial aspect in the “limited duty” a judge owes to these self?represented litigants. OPCA litigants seem to often believe there are no potential negative consequences to their adopting OPCA techniques and strategies. Evidence to the contrary is a challenge to that indoctrination.

Cost awards against OPCA litigants therefore appear to serve at least one purpose that is specific to the OPCA litigation context and that is that they are intended to shake litigants’ confidence in their gurus.

Last edited by troutman; 09-26-2013 at 11:12 AM.
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