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Presentation - 'Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Argument' (OPCA). Royal Bank of Canada v. Francoeur
In Royal Bank of Canada v. Francoeur (Ont CA, 2023) the Court of Appeal considered (and dismissed) an appeal from a proponent of what some call an 'organized pseudolegal commercial argument' (OPCA), and ordered full indemnity costs against them. The Alberta Law Society has published an article on the phenomenon: OPCA Litigants – The Phenomenon of Freemen on the Land::[1] This is an appeal from four summary judgments granted by the motion judge relating to claims by the respondent against the appellant on various mortgages, charges, lines of credit, and a credit card. The motion judge found that the appellant had not advanced any legally tenable defence to the respondent’s claims.
[2] On appeal, the appellant, in essence, repeats the same arguments he advanced before the motion judge. These arguments all revolve around his effort, as an individual, to separate himself from his legal status as a person, and thus submit that he is not governed by, or subject to, any of the laws of this country. In this case, the appellant says that he returned his birth certificate to the Department of Finance Canada and thus, in some fashion, transferred his legal responsibilities to His Majesty the King/The Crown in Right of Canada.
[3] These efforts by certain individuals are well-known to all courts. The individuals who engage in this conduct have been referred to in some previous decisions as Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Argument litigants – a label that apparently emanated from the decision in Meads v. Meads, 2012 ABQB 571, [2013] 3 W.W.R. 419. While they use different techniques, and operate under different names, the central theme is the same.
[4] We do not see it as helpful or appropriate to label individual litigants in this manner. It is sufficient to recognize that there is a common technique employed by these individuals by which they attempt to avoid their legal responsibilities. They attempt to do so by creating a fictional characterization of the facts and, through this deception, suggest that they do not bear legal responsibility for their actions. It is a technique that consistently fails, and which accomplishes little, other than to take up court time, increase costs, and delay the inevitable result.
[5] The motion judge was correct in his conclusion that there were no facts or legal defences offered by the appellant to the respondent’s claims. The summary judgments were properly granted. The appellant’s argument that there was no admissible evidence from the Bank in support of its claims cannot succeed. The Bank filed an affidavit from an employee who attested to the facts about the appellant’s indebtedness drawn from the records of the Bank and produced the documents respecting that indebtedness signed by the appellant. Those business records are admissible under s. 35 of the Evidence Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. E.23.
[6] The appeal is dismissed. The respondent is entitled to its costs of the appeal fixed in the amount of $9,7712.35, inclusive of disbursements and HST, on a full indemnity basis as provided for in the debt agreements.
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