Category: Damages
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Mazerall v Nightingale: The New Brunswick Court of Appeal’s Foundational Statement on Grief and Loss of Companionship Damages for the Death of a Child
On November 19, 1988, Marc and Betty Nightingale were driving with their two children (Kale Joseph Douglas, age six, and Alicia Jean, age nine months) when their vehicle was struck from behind. Both children were killed. Liability was admitted by the defendant Olive Mazerall.
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The 1978 Canadian Damages Trilogy: Andrews, Arnold, and Thornton – The Supreme Court Cases That Capped Pain and Suffering Awards Across Canada
On January 19, 1978, the Supreme Court of Canada handed down three decisions simultaneously. Each arose from a devastating, life-altering injury. Each involved a young person left permanently disabled through someone else's negligence. And together, the three decisions fundamentally reshaped how Canadian courts calculate and award damages in personal injury cases, establishing principles and limits that remain the governing law nearly five decades later.
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Thornton v Board of School Trustees of School District No. 57: The Gymnast, the Springboard, and the School’s Duty of Care
Gary Thornton was fifteen and a half years old, six feet three inches tall, and described in evidence as the epitome of the all-round athlete when he stepped up to attempt an aerial front somersault at Kelly Road Secondary School in Prince George, British Columbia. The jump that April afternoon in 1971 was the first time he had tried this specific exercise. No one had given him specific instruction on how to do it. The instructor was at his desk doing paperwork.
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Andrews v Grand & Toy Alberta Ltd: The Case That Capped Pain and Suffering Damages for Every Injured Canadian
There is a number in Canadian law that almost everyone involved in personal injury or medical malpractice litigation knows: the non-pecuniary damages cap. As of the mid-2020s it stands at approximately $462,000 to $470,000, adjusted for inflation from a figure set in 1978. That original figure, $100,000, came from this case.
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Arnold v Teno: A Four-Year-Old Girl in Windsor, a Ringing Ice Cream Truck, and the Question of Whether the Cap Applies to Children
Of the three cases in the 1978 Damages Trilogy, Arnold v Teno presents the facts that are the most difficult to read. A four-and-a-half-year-old girl. A bright summer holiday. The sound of bells from an ice cream truck. And then, in the seconds it took for a car to reach an intersection and for a small child to cross back in front of a parked truck, a catastrophic brain injury that would define the rest of her life.
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Guimond v Guimond Estate: Confirming the Benchmark and Clarifying Apportionment for Section 10 Fatal Accidents Act Claims in New Brunswick
Five years after Mazerall v Nightingale gave New Brunswick's grief and loss of companionship provisions their foundational principles, the New Brunswick Court of Appeal returned to the same territory in Guimond v Guimond Estate. The case arose from unusual facts (the claims were brought against the estate of the person who had caused the fatal accident), and it addressed a specific question that Nightingale had left open: what happens to the Section 3(4) award when there is only one surviving parent to claim it? And more broadly, does the Act require equal apportionment between parents?
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