The Court of Appeal for British Columbia rejected a rep’s effort to overturn a lower court’s decision, which found that he must repay the balance of a loan that he’d received from his former dealer, CIBC Wood Gundy Inc.
Last May, the Supreme Court of B.C. granted a summary judgment enforcing a settlement agreement between the firm and a former rep, Murray Bockhold, ruling that he still owed the firm $250,000 under an agreement that resolved a dispute between them regarding a $1-million interest-free loan that he received when he joined the firm in 2013.
According to the court’s decision, when Bockhold was terminated in 2018, he owed just over $600,000 on the loan. The firm sued over the debt, but they settled before the case went to trial, with Bockhold to pay $500,000 in two equal payments. He made the first payment, but not the second, which led to the firm suing again to enforce the settlement, seeking the balance owed under the settlement, plus interest.
In his defence, among other things, Bockhold argued that the settlement was invalid. He also filed a counterclaim seeking damages for wrongful dismissal, emotional distress, reputational harm, loss of income and punitive damages.
However, the judge found in favour of the firm, concluding that there was no genuine issue for trial and granting a summary judgment, without addressing all of the issues raised in the counterclaim.
Bockhold appealed that decision, arguing that the lower court judge erred by granting summary judgment in the case, given the issues raised in his counterclaim — and, arguing that the judge failed to consider his defence that the settlement was reached under duress.
Now, the appeal court has rejected the effort to overturn the lower court’s ruling.
In a unanimous decision, the appeal court found that it was open to the judge to grant summary judgment in the case.
“If a defence does not give rise to a genuine issue for trial, then a counterclaim that duplicates that defence will suffer from the same deficiency,” the appeal court said in its decision. It added that “Bockhold was unable to establish a connection between the large-scale institutional wrongdoing he has alleged and the enforceability of the settlement agreement.”
As a result, the appeal court concluded, “I am not persuaded that the judge erred by failing to conclude that the counterclaim rendered summary judgment unsuitable in this case.”
On the question of whether the lower court failed to consider Bockhold’s duress defence, the court found that he never explicitly raised that defence before the lower court.
“Even if Mr. Bockhold had advanced the argument before the judge, the judge would have been compelled to conclude beyond doubt that there was no genuine issue for trial. The judge did not err in failing to consider an argument that was not available on the record before her,” the appeal court said in dismissing the appeal.