Category: British Columbia law
Clements, class actions, general causation
The statistical possibility of factual causation less than a probability may be enough for general causation in products liability class actions, even if it means the compensated class includes persons whose injury was not, in fact, caused by the product. See Bartram v. GlaxoSmithKline Inc., 2012 BCSC 1804 at paras. 27-35.
Don’t Confuse Me With The Law
Peso v. Hollaway, 2012 BCSC 1763 is another case where there is a discontinuity between the trial judge’s statement of the law and the trial judge’s conclusion. The result seems to be supportable on the evidence set out by the trial judge. The decision, ultimately, is based on the judge preferring the plaintiff’s evidence over the defendant’s.
Yeah … well… but …
Quinn v. Leathem, [1901] A.C. 495 at 506 (H.L.)
[A] case is only an authority for what it actually decides. I entirely deny that it can be quoted for a proposition that may seem to follow logically from it. Such a mode of reasoning assumes that the law is necessarily a logical code, whereas every lawyer must acknowledge that the law is not always logical at all.
Who’s The Boss (2): The Current Boss vs The Old Boss
Who’s The Boss (1) is here.
Peter Townshend, of The Who fame, wrote “Meet the new boss / Same as the old boss” as part of the lyrics to “Won’t Get Fooled Again“.
But this post isn’t about The Who.
Nor is this about Bruce Springsteen, but I suspect the mere fact I’ve used that name may get more automated looks at this message than I’d get if I’d written “Phil Ochs” of “Joe Btfsplk”. Not that I write for tweets or followers, of course. Heaven forfend.
Well, I could hope that I had nine particular followers, or at least 4 of 9 plus one to come, but I’m not holding my breath.
Who’s the Boss
[Originally posted on Slaw.ca on September 7, 2012]
A very witty Master of the Alberta Supreme Court once wrote:
[51] Any legal system which has a judicial appeals process inherently creates a pecking order for the judiciary regarding where judicial decisions stand on the legal ladder.
[52] I am bound by decisions of Queen’s Bench judges, by decisions of the Alberta Court of Appeal and by decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada. Very simply, Masters in Chambers of a superior trial court occupy the bottom rung of the superior courts judicial ladder.
[53] I do not overrule decisions of a judge of this court. The judicial pecking order does not permit little peckers to overrule big peckers. It is the other way around.
South Side Woodwork v. R.C. Contracting (1989), 95 AR 161, 1989 CanLII 3384 (AB QB, Master)
Whence the title of this posting.
The 4th Monkey Still in Abstenia 