Renn A. Holness is a gifted lawyer and author to over 1000 legal blog articles. Married father of two daughters, son of a neurosurgeon and founder of Holness and Small Law Group
ICBC is in trouble again with allegations of bad behaviour by an insured. This plaintiff had Autoplan insurance coverage from ICBC for a 1990 Ferrari F40 when he accidentally drove the Vehicle into a utility pole, leaving it badly damaged. The plaintiff said that ICBC took control of the vehicle immediately after the accident and never relinquished…
Proposed Changes to Awards for Pain and Suffering in British Columbia For injury victims of car accidents, the NDP government is planning to legislate a $5,500 cap on injury claims for pain and suffering starting in 2019. This will destroy the gains injury victims have made over reckless culprits, bad drivers and highway offenders. Allowing the current…
In this precedent changing personal injury Court of Appeal decision, the injury claimant, struck by another vehicle on the passenger side where she was seated, was awarded $1,782,068, including $418,000 for loss of housekeeping capacity at trial. We focus on this exciting new statement from the court of appeal embracing this claim for loss of housekeeping capacity…
This pedestrian suffered serious injuries when he was struck by a runaway snowmobile. The snowmobile operator had been thrown off the machine and the snowmobile sped one kilometre across open terrain before striking the claimant (Passerin v. Webb,2018 BCSC 289). The snowmobiler was not using the the tether cord which would have automatically shut off…
ICBC continues to show a lack of respect to the court and to claimants by refusing to pay a law society trust administration fee. The auto insurance monopoly ICBC, wanting total control over the claim process, has ignored the ongoing orders and directions of the Supreme Court. ICBC employs many lawyers to assist ICBC adjusters…
A car accident injury claimant is entitled to appeal a Supreme Court decision to the Court of Appeal. However, as shown in our case study, absent a palpable and overriding error affecting the trial judge’s assessment of the facts, the Appeal Court will not interfere with a finding of fact or an inference based on those facts.…
The first tip, the ICBC adjuster works for ICBC not the injured claimant. ICBC does not assign claimants their own advocates after a car accident. No one at the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, ICBC, will look out for the claimants best interests when it comes to settling an injury case. Second tip for ICBC injury…
The Court of Appeal has ruled that admitting liability and settling a lawsuit but also denying liability in another lawsuit for the same car accident is not an abuse of process. (Glover v. Leakey,2018 BCCA 56) This case involved a car accident in which two lawsuits were commenced by different occupants. In one lawsuit ICBC admitted their…
The amount awarded for cost of future care can be adjusted up or down to take into account the availability of other benefits. In this Court of Appeal decision the court reaffirms this principle as it relates to the likelihood of continued publicly funded home care from Alberta Health Services (AHS). The injury claimant was involved…
The train conductor was negligent for colliding with a van because he failed to notice that the signal lights had not been flashing before the train entered the crossing. The claimant was seriously injured in the accident and had no memory of the events. The claimant pleaded guilty to a charge under s. 144 of the Motor Vehicle…