Toronto Injury Lawyer Blog
Cases can be similar. But not the same. No two cases are alike.
The same can be said for Judges. They can be similar, but they aren’t the same. No two Judges are alike; nor do they see things alike.
But, what the public and what personal injury lawyers look for is consistency in judicial decisions. When there are legal principals which address the same point; the same law ought to be applied; and should result in a predictable outcome once the law is applied to the case at hand.
We are going to share with you two cases, which dealt with the exact same thing. Yet, the outcomes were completely different! This doesn’t happen often, but it can happen.
Both cases involve car accident cases dealing with minors (people under the age of 18). When there is a Plaintiff, or a claimant under the age of 18; personal injury lawyers and insurance companies seek for Judges to approve of the settlement. There are many policy reasons for this. It’s a good public policy to protect the interests and the rights of minors. We want to make sure that the settlement is equitable and just. We want to make sure that the minor’s funds aren’t misappropriated. We don’t want the minors coming back to the Courts once they’ve hit the age of majority and suggest that the settlement was improvident; or something which they should never have agreed to in the first place. These policy reasons are important both for Plaintiffs and Defendants alike.
