Not an ounce of quit in self-represented litigant
One of the province’s most tenacious self-represented litigants is under pressure to throw in the towel after nearly a decade of legal battles over the loss of her fortune and her home.
At 77, the once-successful businesswoman, entrepreneur and North Vancouver district councillor Joan Gadsby can’t afford the $5,000 the B.C. Court of Appeal says she must pay to continue her quest for restitution.
“I went from being a multimillionaire to being forced out of my Upper Capilano Highlands home — a soul-destroying and traumatizing event — to being temporarily homeless for the first time in my life and sleeping on a couch of a long-term friend for six weeks,” the pugnacious Gadsby complained. “The broken court system throws one out of one’s home of 43 years, takes away my development, my livelihood and retirement planning, and totally devastates my life financially, and wants me to pay to continue with my fight for justice. This is so wrong!”
Gadsby grew up in Ontario, but has lived and worked in Vancouver since the 1960s. A graduate of Western University in London, Ont., she was the second woman through the MBA program at the University of B.C. She was a presence in North Shore municipal politics for nearly 15 years.
But it wasn’t all a paved road — she lost a son to brain cancer and a daughter to breast cancer, and Gadsby ended up on prescription pills. She wrote a book, Addiction by Prescription — One Woman’s Triumph and Fight for Change, and her ordeal was turned into a national TV documentary.
Through hard work, Gadsby reclaimed her life and, in the early aughts, was worth millions — most of which she invested in a Sunshine Coast real estate development.
But the international money crisis in 2008 pushed her onto the financial shoals. Gadsby foundered.
When she went looking for a lawyer to help, she said they all turned a deaf ear — more than 40 firms — and attempts to enlist senior legal figures she knew from her time in politics were futile. Gadsby acknowledged her case was highly challenging, she couldn’t afford the legal fees and there was the usual difficulty facing someone attacking the status quo.
Her resulting solo legal odyssey is documented in piles of paperwork detailing appearances before a dozen masters and justices of the B.C. Supreme Court and Court of Appeal. She lost.
“My life has been devastated, my losses exceed $6 million and I have been in major litigation for seven years and continue to be as a self-represented litigant out of financial necessity fighting for justice,” Gadsby said.
She was stripped of her Seaview Villa Estates development “with projected revenue of $18 million to $20 million and projected profit of $6.1 million,” she said.
“I was described by the judge in the foreclosure action as a ‘sophisticated business woman who can rebuild my wealth’ — an incredible comment given that I was 74 years old at the time,” she complained.
In 2013, the court ordered her North Shore home at 4507 Cedarcrest Ave. sold. The original offer presented was $855,000 — Gadsby howled that was way too low. That led to a bidding process between two interested purchasers and the house sold for $876,000. Within weeks, it was resold for $1.1 million.
Gadsby appealed, but her pleas were dismissed: The courts said the 1.2-hectare development and home were properly liquidated.
Her predicament left her angry — her surviving daughter, with her two adolescent grandchildren, are estranged from her because of the conflict — and Gadsby is living on the generosity of friends, supplemented by a meagre amount from consulting on property development, municipal issues and addiction.
She refused to accept the courts’ findings.
She is on YouTube and has a page on the crowd-funding website Fundrazr. She’s working on a second book — tentatively titled Indomitable Spirit, Unbreakable Will — Surviving Nine Years of Hell: Global Recession, Economic Meltdown, Systemic Failures, Corporate and Bank Bailouts, Deception, Lies, Collusion, Money, Greed, Lack of Ethics and Taking Back My Life Again.
In November 2016, she filed a new suit alleging fraud, naming the B.C. attorney general’s ministry, the lawyer representing the mortgage company, realtors, the appraisal company and John Doe, the bidder who flipped her home. The defendants moved to have the new litigation dismissed as an abuse of process and argued the limitation period had expired.
A justice in June ruled the pleadings regarding her home weren’t an abuse of process, but that Gadsby had been too tardy. He refused to exempt her from the filing deadline and dismissed the case, noting there wasn’t a scintilla of evidence to suggest a conspiracy of any sort.
In August, she filed a similar claim regarding the Seaview development, adding allegations of unjust enrichment and negligence.
Gadsby filed her appeal of the June decision and some of the defendants applied for her to post security, saying her pleadings were baseless and they would be out of pocket for normally recoverable costs because of her poverty.
“The appeal appears to have minimal merit,” agreed Justice Richard Goepel of the high bench. “Given all of the above, it is appropriate to make an order for security for costs.”
He told Gadsby to post $5,000 by the end of the month. She wants desperately to keep going and hoped to borrow the funds from her remaining friends.
“More confirmation that the court system is seriously broken,” she fumed.