Canada’s longest-running judicial matter ends | The Castor case
Business | February 22, 2016
This 23-year long auditors' negligence case and related cases concluded after the Ontario Superior Court of Justice sanctioned a settlement plan submitted by the audit firm Coopers & Lybrand Chartered Accountants (Coopers) under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA), resolving negligence claims that have languished in court for decades.
A multitude of lawsuits against Coopers and each of the individual partners of the firm practicing in Canada were instituted in 1993 and 1994 in the Quebec Superior Court making the Castor litigation the largest auditors' negligence case in Canadian history.
Quick facts about the Castor matter (1992-2015)
- Nearly 100 creditors claimed over $1 billion from Coopers.
- Nearly 12 years were devoted by the Quebec Superior Court to the hearing of the test case against Coopers. As an example, the testimony of an expert witness lasted more than three years.
- 56 of Coopers professional indemnity insurers faced proceedings seeking a declaration from the Quebec Superior Court that each of the insurance policies forming the worldwide professional liability coverage of Coopers was governed by Quebec law with the ensuing result that defence costs did not erode the policy limits and, furthermore, that interest accrued on these policy limits.
- Approximately 15 interlocutory judgments were rendered by Justice André Prévost in the insurance litigation of the Castor matter.
André Legrand, Jean Bertrand, Dominic Dupoy, François-David Paré, Andres Garin, Caroline Larouche and Sophie Gagnon represented Coopers’ captive insurer in the insurance litigation and assisted it in connection with the CCAA proceedings in Ontario.
Orestes Pasparakis, Evan Cobb and Stephen Taylor represented the group of international professional indemnity insurers that played a key role in the success of the plan in the CCAA proceedings before the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.
For further information please contact:
Elisabeth Besson, Media Relations Manager
Tel: +1 514 847 4349; Mob: +1 514 688 0876
elisabeth.besson@nortonrosefulbright.com
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