In the following personal injury case the claimant represented herself against a horse-riding business offering guided trail rides to customers. The claimant fell off a horse that she had rented while on a trail ride led by one of the guides (Starrett v. Campbell,2015 BCSC 1424). The claimant did not hire a lawyer to represent her at trial and…
If you settle an injury claim with ICBC after a car accident, and receive lifetime payments from an annuity, should those payments be considered income for the purpose of child support payment obligations? We help answer that question in the following case review. K.T. suffered serious injuries in a motor vehicle accident and entered into a settlement…
The Court of Appeal has allowed an appeal of a police offer found 20% at fault for injury and death caused by a suicidal individual who drove his vehicle into oncoming traffic killing himself and the other driver (Bergen v. Guliker, 2015 BCCA 283). This case establishes that there is currently no recognized duty of care owned to the…
In British Columbia it is assumed that every personal injury claimant is entitled to the confidentiality implicit in his or her attendance in a physician’s examining room and protection of his or her privacy on a personal matter, absent serious concerns relating to health or safety, or express legislative provisions compelling release of the information in the…
The Court of Appeal has upheld a double legal costs award against the Province of British Columbia after the Province lost a claim against a private BC company (British Columbia v. Salt Spring Ventures Incorporated,2015 BCCA 343) . Even though the settlement offer was not one which ought reasonably to have been accepted by the Province…
This ICBC personal injury claim arose out of two rear-end motor vehicle accidents. The claimant was involved in a third accident in which he was at fault. The question arose as to what impact, if any, the claimant’s responsibility for the third accident should have on the defendants’ liability for the consequences of his injuries (Derksen v. Nicholson,Insurance…
The Court of Appeal ordered a new trial for this 15 year old car accident personal injury claim involving soft tissue injury, mild traumatic brain injury and unaccepted ICBC offers of $50,000, $110,00 and $120,000 (Han v. Park, 2015 BCCA 324). A documents binder allowed to be given to the jury included: a police accident report; the…
This personal injury claimant, born and raised in the Lower Mainland, was awarded $14,000 for his legal costs and the defendant was ordered the pay the trial costs of the his medical experts (Mothe v. Silva,2015 BCSC 1053 ). The claimant was injured in a motor vehicle accident that occurred at River Road in Richmond, BC…
When injured as a passenger on a public bus, public carriers and bus drivers have a heavy burden to establish that they used all due, proper and reasonable care and skill to avoid or prevent injury to the passenger. This principle was reaffirmed in the personal injury case of Hutchinson v. Dyck, 2015 BCSC 1039. The claimant was…
A new cost-benefit analysis for admission of expert reports introduced by the Supreme Court of Canada expands the gatekeeping role of judges in Canada (White Burgess Langille Inman v. Abbott and Haliburton Co., 2015 SCC 23). This development will change the landscape of expert evidence in personal injury lawsuits, especially when it comes to the hired guns such as…