2017 QCCQ 1754, 2017 QCCQ 1754

Esposito c. Da Costa 2017 QCCQ 1754 COURT OF QUEBEC Small Claims Division CANADA PROVINCE OF QUEBEC DISTRICT OF MONTREAL Civil Division No: 500-32-149544-159 DATE: March 3, 2017 ______________________________________________________________________ BY THE HONOURABLE JEFFREY EDWARDS, J.C.Q. ______________________________________________________________________ AGOSTINO ESPOSITO Plaintiff v.

JOSE JR DA COSTA Defendant ______________________________________________________________________ JUDGMENT ______________________________________________________________________ [ 1 ] Plaintiff is suing Defendant, an attorney, for alleged faults committed by him as an attorney while representing the opposite party, namely Plaintiff’s former girlfriend and the mother of his child in various Family Law legal proceedings. [ 2 ] Defendant represented Plaintiff’s former girlfriend in three separate legal proceedings regarding the determination of an alimentary pension as well as access and custody rights regarding their child. [ 3 ] The relevant facts regarding the history between Plaintiff and the mother of his child are set out in three Superior Court judgments in 2010: A… E… v.

M… D… (Justice Diane Marcelin, J.S.C.) [1] , in 2012 : A… E… v. M… C… (Justice Sylviane Borenstein, J.S.C.) [2] and in 2015: A… E… v. M… D… (Justice Marc St-Pierre, J.S.C.) [3] . [ 4 ] The hearing in the last of these cases took place on June 17, 2015. Judgment was rendered on June 30, 2015. [ 5 ] On September 25, 2015, Plaintiff sent Defendant a demand letter [4] which states as follows: “ Letter of demand for false allegations and abusive actions, by negligent attorney. It has not been once but several times in court you use strategy to make me look bad.

it has to stop due to your actions I Agostino Esposito ask you With the time you receive this letter 10 days to send proof of actions or I will take actions For sum of 15.000$ and reserve my right for grater sum. 1. you claim I am a violent individual. 2. You claim harassing my x girl friend. 3. calling centrejeunesse 6 times. 4. i make more that I declare fraud the government all this ends.” [ 6 ] In his judicial application, Plaintiff alleges that Defendant is liable as a result of: 1. False allegations made by Defendant; 2. Abusive actions of Defendant; 3.

Perjury of Defendant. [ 7 ] At the hearing before the undersigned, there were certain admitted statements adduced by consent as evidence by the parties: 1. A social worker with the local Centre de la jeunesse would have testified that Mr. Da Costa did represent to the Court on behalf of his client that Defendant had complained (“ signalement ”) to the local Centre de la jeunesse on three (3) occasions regarding the mother’s behaviour towards their child. The social worker would testify that was not the case and that none of the complaints were made by Plaintiff. 2.

Ivan Grabizon, an attorney who had represented Plaintiff in the first two legal proceedings would testify that Defendant had represented to the Court (in some occasions, outside of the Courtroom) that Plaintiff:

a) was a violent individual;

b) was harassing the mother of his child;

c) had called the social worker at the Centre de la jeunesse about the mother of his child on six (6) to nine (9) occasions;

d) had called the social welfare office about the mother of his child;

e) had called the police on several occasions about the mother of his child. [ 8 ] Defendant denies any liability and states that he only made relevant and required representations on behalf of his client in the context of the legal proceedings. He states that he never knowingly made any false representations. He also states that he never testified in any of the legal proceedings or hearing and that he only acted as an attorney.

[ 9 ] Defendant refers to several parts of the judgments rendered in the dispute between Plaintiff and his former girlfriend to show that the proof in fact supported the representations that he made and that the various judges who rendered their decisions came to the conclusion that the evidence did support those representations. [ 10 ] Defendant refers to the following paragraphs from the three (3) judgments rendered involving Plaintiff and his former girlfriend. [ 11 ] In her judgment rendered in 2010, Justice Marcelin wrote: [31] Il faut voir que Monsieur possède un physique imposant par son poids et peut certainement faire peur à Madame qui est plutôt petite et mince.

D’ailleurs, elle témoigne qu’il la menace de partir avec l’enfant. P… Du… témoigne avoir aussi été menacée par Monsieur si elle venait témoigner. [32] Mais, il y a plus.

En plus d’avoir déposé des plaintes criminelles contre des membres de la famille de Madame, Monsieur fait cinq signalements au Directeur de la protection de la jeunesse (la DPJ). [33] La DPJ retiendra trois signalements, mais fermera à chaque fois le dossier compte tenu que le personnel qui fait enquête vient à la conclusion que l’enfant n’est pas en danger et que sa sécurité n’est pas compromise. [34] Il faut voir aussi que Monsieur fait une dénonciation à la police à l’effet qu’il y aurait des menaces de mort à l’endroit de l’enfant.

Plusieurs voitures de police se pointent chez Madame et ses parents pour enquêter pour finalement ne pas retenir cette plainte. [36] Nous avons vu plus haut que Monsieur surveille Madame et lui reproche de sortir avec des copains ou encore de découcher à l’occasion. Madame témoigne qu’elle ne sort jamais sans avoir nourri, changé et couché l’enfant. Lorsqu’elle sort ainsi, ce sont les parents de Madame qui gardent l’enfant. [53] La preuve a duré deux jours et demi. Tout au long de l’enquête, Monsieur a tenté de dénigrer le caractère moral de Madame, de nier ses capacités parentales.

Il a déclaré aux policiers et à la DPJ que Madame était bipolaire alors qu’il n’y a pas un iota de preuve à cet effet. Certes, Madame est épileptique, mais ses crises sont rares et sa médication contrôle bien son problème. Elle est consciente qu’elle doit être fidèle à sa prise de médicaments. [54] La soussignée a rarement vu un dossier où on y retrouve un tel acharnement de la part d’une partie. La preuve révèle abondamment que Monsieur est très jaloux, possessif et contrôlant. [55] Ses accès de colère contre Madame sont inexcusables.

Son harcèlement téléphonique, son attitude ainsi que la violence verbale dont il fait preuve à l’endroit de Madame sont aussi inexcusables. Ses signalements à la DPJ, sans motif, sont aussi inexcusables. [58] Les épisodes de violence de monsieur ne font pas de doute. Le Tribunal ne le croit pas quand il dit qu’il se défend passivement seulement. P… Du… a bien raconté comment Monsieur a plaqué Madame entre deux réfrigérateurs au restaurant qu’il détenait auparavant. [59] L’incident où Monsieur a utilisé le « mace » contre Madame démontre son agressivité, sa jalousie et son manque de jugement.

Il est difficile de croire que Madame aurait eu la force de brandir une épée de samouraï vu sa taille. Même si cela était vrai, compte tenu que Monsieur fait plus de deux fois le poids de Madame, il aurait pu facilement contrôler cette dernière si elle brandissait effectivement une telle épée ou à tout le moins changer de pièce. L’utilisation du « mace » est tout simplement une utilisation disproportionnée de force contre une femme enceinte.

[68] Pour le moment, les actions de monsieur militent contre des accès prolongés. D’ailleurs, son attitude durant l’enquête est révélatrice. À plus d’une reprise, il parle au témoin qui témoigne, interromp son avocat, lui suggère des questions, agit de façon agressive. Durant son témoignage, surtout lors du contre-interrogatoire, il refuse de répondre, répond de façon vague et quelque fois répond des platitudes. Le Tribunal a dû l’aviser à plus d’une reprise de ne pas interrompre les témoins ou encore de ne pas donner son opinion durant le témoignage d’un témoin.

Il démontre peu de respect. [ 12 ] In her judgment rendered in 2012, Justice Borenstein, J.C.S. wrote : [5] The father’s harassment has continued after Justice Marcelin’s judgment and necessitated an order of the Court, as recently as last June, ordering the father not to communicate with X’s daycare. [12] The Court hopes that the father will focus on his son’s best interest which is not to be the object of multiple, unfounded denunciations to the police or DPJ. [ 13 ] In his 2015 judgment, Justice St-Pierre, J.C.S. wrote: [14] Néanmoins, non seulement le demandeur n’a pas fourni son rapport d’impôt 2014 mais en plus il refuse de répondre aux questions lorsque pressé en contre-interrogatoire de donner des précisions, notamment sur le total des loyers, pour ensuite offrir un chiffre approximatif de 60-70 000 $ par année; quant aux dépenses, il invoque d’abord la nécessité d’autorisation de sa mère pour pouvoir fournir les informations demandées puis il donne ensuite un chiffre de 6 000 $ par mois ne reposant apparemment sur rien, faisant en sorte d’ailleurs que les dépenses excéderaient les revenus alors que c’est faux. [ 14 ] As appears from the above extracts of judgments rendered by the Superior Court, the various judges agreed that the evidence adduced at the time of the hearings supported the representations made by Defendant. [ 15 ] If the Plaintiff is of the view that the judges’ findings were not accurate or supported by the evidence, his appropriate recourse would be to file an appeal before the Court of Appeal. [ 16 ] In the present matter, according to the representations made by the parties, it appears that an appeal was in fact taken from Justice Marcellin’s judgment.

That appeal was dismissed. [ 17 ] An appeal was not taken from Justice St-Pierre’s judgment. Instead, it appears that Plaintiff has decided to sue Defendant. [ 18 ] Given the evidence and the previous judgments rendered, such a recourse is manifestly unfounded. [ 19 ] The present claim appears to be a disguised appeal from the judgment of Justice St-Pierre.

It is an unacceptable method to punish the Defendant for having successfully represented his client’s rights and for having successfully contested Plaintiff’s claims. [ 20 ] Since the findings of fact contained in the three Superior Court judgments support the representations of the Defendant, and those findings are final in that they have neither been varied nor reversed in appeal, there is no basis in fact or in law to support Plaintiff’s allegations that Defendant committed a fault in making such representations. [ 21 ] Furthermore, even if the representations made by Defendant had been found to be wrong, which is not the case, as a rule of law, as long as Defendant as an attorney did not know or have an objective and professional reason to suspect that the information conveyed to him by his client was false and to the extent that it was relevant to the questions in issue, Quebec jurisprudence has decided that an

attorney making such allegations benefits from a civil liability immunity as to representations that were not accurate or well founded. [ 22 ] In La responsabilité civile , J.-L. Baudouin and P. Deslauriers wrote [5] : “L’avocat jouit cependant d’une immunité relative puisque, dans l’intérêt même de la justice, il est important que le débat judiciaire puisse avoir lieu d’une façon directe et franche. Celui-ci doit toutefois être frappé au coin de la bonne foi. Il convient donc de déterminer si les allégations ou les propos tenus étaient (même s’ils s’avèrent par la suite non fondé

s) faits de bonne foi, dans le but de permettre de faire valoir les droits du client ou, au contraire, de façon téméraire ou dans le but de nuire à la personne à l’encontre de laquelle ils ont été proférés.” [ 23 ] With regard to the allegation that Defendant committed perjury during the hearing of June 2015, the evidence was that the Defendant never testified and was never involved in a personal capacity in the legal proceedings. His intervention was limited to legal representations on behalf of his client.

There can be therefore no question as to perjury which is limited to testimony or a solemn written statement of a party or a witness. [ 24 ] Plaintiff has established no fault giving rise to the civil liability of Defendant. Plaintiff’s judicial demand will be dismissed, with costs. FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT: DISMISSES Plaintiff Agostino Esposito’s Judicial Demand against Jose Jr. Da Costa; WITH LEGAL COSTS of $190 (Judicial Court Stamp) against Plaintiff Agostino Esposito. __________________________________ Jeffrey Edwards, J.C.Q. Date of hearing: January 10, 2017