Success StoriesAs a consequence of our work on behalf of persons who have suffered personal injuries, we have had the opportunity to work closely with the British Columbia Paraplegic Association, which provides services to individuals who have sustained spinal cord injuries. The lawyers of Steele Urquhart have supported the efforts the BCPA for almost 30 years. In 2008, we were proud to sponsor the BCPA’s weeklong workshop for counsellors from throughout the Province, which was held in Vancouver. We have obtained an award of punitive damages of $75,000 against a major international bank and a bailiff for the wrongful seizure of the assets of an automobile repair business. The award was in addition to compensation awarded for the actual damage suffered by the business and was largely predicated on the bank’s and bailiff’s failure to return the property promptly once they had learned that the had improperly seized the property. We have successfully represented individuals who have been injured and the families of individuals who have been killed in airplane crashes in British Columbia. In one instance, the case had been brought by American lawyers in Washington State in an attempt to avoid the application of British Columbia’s workers compensation laws that would have prevented the recover of any compensation. After the Washington Court dismissed the case, Steele Urquhart was successful in obtaining a ruling that the workers compensation law of British Columbia did not apply. Although the time for commencing a lawsuit in British Columbia had expired by the time Steele Urquhart was brought into the case, we were able to obtain a settlement on the basis that the limitation period had been extended. We have successfully represented individuals in proceedings to recover disability payments that have been wrongfully denied to them by their own insurance companies. Many of these cases involve arbitrary decisions made by claims examiners based on inaccurate and incomplete information. We successfully represented a hotel chain in a dispute concerning a supplier of fine china in a claim for breach of the Sale of Goods Act. The case concerned the effect of the supplier changing the descriptive mark on the porcelain china. The court concluded that the descriptive mark formed part of the description of the china and that by changing that mark without advising the hotel chain the supplier had breached the Sale of Goods Act and was thereby liable for damages. We represented a homeowner being sued by an individual alleging that there was an oral agreement for sale of the subject property. We successfully defended the case both in the Supreme Court of British Columbia and on appeal.
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Rod Urquhart and Gregory Steele
We defended and employer in a claim for damages for wrongful dismissal succeeding in demonstrating that the employee had resigned and had not been dismissed from employment. In an Administrative Law matter, we appeared before the Appeal Division in an appeal of a decision of the Criminal Injury Compensation Program, to discontinue pension benefits to a victim of crime, resulting in the decision being set aside and the pension being reinstated. Representing a foreign bank in various foreclosure proceedings to enforce security and obtain repayment of outstanding debts in commercial and residential matters. We successfully represented a professional engineer in disciplinary proceedings before the Association of Professional Engineers. We succeeded in obtaining the dismissal of the claim of a wholesale supplier of jewelry against a jewelry importer as a consequence of the failure of the wholesale supplier to post security for costs. Mr. Urquhart acted as a commissioner for the taking of deposition evidence of witnesses located within British Columbia in lawsuits commenced in the United States. |
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