Chronicles of Twatrick: Damned if he does, ...

(NOTE: You need to read the previous post before diving into this one, as I am addressing one of the comments there.)

In my last post, I talked about Patrick's rapidly-dwindling options in terms of forging ahead with contesting my Rule 4.33 Application, or possibly just bailing on the whole thing and dropping the lawsuit before the August 20 hearing to spare himself the crippling humiliation. Well, it turns out that he's really painted himself into a corner no matter what he does.

A general rule of civil actions is that if you sue someone, and cause them to incur legal expenses, then later announce, "Ah, never mind, let's just forget the whole thing, I'm dropping the suit," you are pretty much guaranteed to be hit with a costs award due to the expenses you forced the Defendant to incur; the Defendant will be entitled to file for what are called "discontinuance costs" because you chose to "discontinue" the action after having filed it in the first place.

Discontinuance costs could vary anywhere from "partial" indemnity (perhaps 40-60% of their costs), up to "full" indemnity (solicitor-client costs, meaning you'll owe them every dime they had to spend) if the Court is really unhappy with your behaviour. So what does that have to do with Patrick? I'm glad you asked.

I asked Google about how discontinuance costs relate to Rule 4.33 Applications, and I was told the following:

So let's chat about the above, shall we?

In the above, Rule 4.36 represents just the general rule about discontinuance costs, regardless of the nature of the lawsuit. But the rest of that talks about how that Rule interacts specifically with a Rule 4.33 Application, and it's there that Patrick appears to be screwed.

• Ignore the first bullet point, that talks about Rule 4.36 in general.
• You can ignore the second bullet point as that doesn't apply here.
• It's that third point where Patrick is in deep shit.

Normally, even if someone drops their action against you, you don't get full costs; more likely, you'll get partial or perhaps "substantial" costs, but it takes the Court getting really pissed off with you to order you to pay the full solicitor-client costs, and that's what that third point is talking about.

The standard Rules of Civil Procedure dictate that while being nailed with solicitor-client costs is unusual, the Court has the discretion to do that if it finds that the lawsuit was vexatious, frivolous or an "abuse of process." And that's what that third point is explaining.

What it says is that if you're already the target of a Rule 4.33 Application (as Patrick is here), the Court will look very unkindly on you suddenly dropping your action as it could be interpreted as simply trying to avoid the inevitable Rule 4.33 hearing and beatdown. As that third bullet point clearly reads, that kind of behaviour could very well be considered by the Court to be "abuse of process" and, once upon a time, I showed exactly how that can be used by a judge to justify full solicitor-client costs in a Rule 4.33 Application:

 

 

Let me summarize all of that. If a judge finds that Patrick's conduct in all of this rises to the level of abuse of process, that judge is free to award me full solicitor-client costs -- my costs going all the way back to August of 2022 when Patrick first filed this idiotic lawsuit. And one of the reasons to find abuse of process is (hilariously) if Patrick drops this lawsuit after I filed my Rule 4.33 Application.

Really, appreciate the irony here. If Patrick tries to salvage the situation by dropping his lawsuit before the August 20 hearing, the Court is free to interpret that as "abuse of process", which can justify a full costs award for me. At this point, there's really no way for Patrick to win here. 

P.S. I hope I explained adequately that Patrick dropping his lawsuit at this point would actually work against him as the Court clearly explains that that sort of timing is exactly what it would see as an abuse of process. Patrick really has buried himself here. At this point, he can't even walk away without getting spanked.

Chronicles of Twatrick: Submit a Response Affidavit, he must.

In an earlier post, I mentioned that, in response to a Rule 4.33 Application, the Plaintiff (Patrick "Super Nexus Quadruple Chin Cheeseburger" Ross) would normally be expected to submit a "Response Affidavit," outlining his proposed defence, the purpose being to give my side time to examine his plans for a defense.

Well, it's stricter than that since, if Patrick plans on defending (and it's not clear what possible defense he would have), he must submit such an Affidavit or he will not even be allowed to present a defense at the upcoming hearing on August 20.

Once again, I give you Google AI (which has proven remarkably accurate so far):

 

 

I draw your attention to the bullet point "Challenging the Applicant":

"Without your own evidence, the court only reviews the applicant's record and may automatically dismiss the claim."

In short, Patrick can't just show up the morning of August 20 and start free associating a defense and pulling nonsense out of his ample, cheeseburger-fueled ass -- he needs to put it into an Affidavit, and properly file and serve it, so there will be no day-of ambush litigating from Patrick of which he is so fond.

P.S. Once I receive that Response Affidavit, I will post it here. 

P.P.S. Note the strict requirements for this Affidavit -- explanations for delay must be officially sworn into the record, not simply scrawled by Patrick on the back of a napkin with his crayons, and exhibits must include all notices, correspondence and court documents to bolster Patrick's arguments. In other words, Patrick has some serious work to do over the next week or so to put all that together to deliver it to me in a timely manner.

He might want to get cracking on that. 

BONUS TRACK: It's worth noting that, compared to what I had to do to file a Rule 4.33 Application, Patrick has considerably more work to do to contest it.

For my part, all that was necessary was to claim that more than three years had gone by and there had been no significant advancement and no agreement to suspend the action. I did not have to supply any proof of any of this since you can't prove a negative.

On the other hand, if Patrick wants to contest the application, he does have work to do in terms of claiming and documenting said advancement, producing and swearing into the record agreements or whatever it is he wants to present to the Court and so on. In other words, the burden of proof is entirely on Patrick to provide positive evidence to defeat my application, and he needs to put it all in an Affidavit and get it to me well in advance of the hearing. Which is why he might want to start working on that real soon now.

OH, ONE MORE THING: Patrick has already assured me that:

1. He will attend the August 20 hearing, and
2. He will win.

So we'll see how that goes. 

A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT TAKE: I asked Google a slightly different question about the Response Affidavit and got this:

 

For me, the most interesting part is that the Response Affidavit must have a "focused scope"; as in, "Must be strictly limited to replying to the evidence and arguments raised by the applicant."

In other words, it can't follow Patrick's pattern of being a rambling list of historical grievances; it needs to address only the issues in my Application, which is really going to cramp Patrick's style. Oh, and there's that "timely service" requirement again, which is why Patrick might stop obsessing over Candace Owens and get to work.

JUST FOR FUN, I asked one more reworded question of Google AI: "What if the Plaintiff in a Rule 4.33 Application fails to file a Response Affidavit?" And once again, it would end very badly for Patrick:

 

 

And once again, Patrick might want to get to work on that.

Chronicles of Twatrick: All quiet on the doofus front.

Nothing really new to report this morning, there's plenty of recent blog posts to entertain you. Just a reminder that, before the upcoming August 20 "Drop Dead" Rule 4.33 hearing at the Grande Prairie, Alberta courthouse, I will supply the Webex link so you can dial in and spectate.

As you will have read in the previous post, Patrick is making ominous sounds about how he's planning some sort of sinister surprise for me. I guess we'll just wait and see how that works out, given that he has promised to attend. That's right ... I have correspondence in which Patrick Ross has assured me that he will be attending that hearing. So he really better show.

BONUS TRACK: It is worth noting that if Patrick wants to contest this Application, he would do so by filing a "Response Affidavit" laying out the basis for his defense:

 

 

In other words, he must properly file such an Affidavit and give me time to examine it before the hearing, meaning he can't just show up on August 20 and try to surprise the Court with some novel and incomprehensible argument involving depression or garage sales.

Chronicles of Twatrick: "Three massive weaknesses," you say?

I just recently noticed this annoyingly vague and meaningless tweet from Lloydminster's favourite village idiot and homeless bankrupt:

 

 

and anyone who's followed Patrick's bizarre and weaselly rhetoric over the years can see that he's holding true to form. You see, Patrick's most common rhetorical weapon is to publish ominous but ambiguous threats with no specifics whatsoever, leaving readers to scratch their heads and wonder what the fuck he's blithering on about.

Patrick's ambiguity is couched in suggestions of risk and danger, one of his favourite tricks being to publish something like, "Well, it seems a certain someone did a certain something, not knowing about the possible consequences to that someone of doing that something ..."; you know what I mean since you've undoubtedly seen it before. Vagueness and ambiguity and head-scratching lack of detail.

And there's Patrick above, trying very hard to sound menacing and sinister while, you know, divulging absolutely no details as to what I should be worried about or why. One wonders if Patrick has yet figured out that, in the upcoming August 20 "Rule 4.33" hearing, the single issue before the Court will be the fact that he failed to advance his lawsuit against me for more than three straight years. That's it -- the Court will not entertain any arguments that don't relate directly to that.

So it's not clear why my blogging about Patrick's weaselly, ambiguous vagueness will have anything to do with August 20, although it would be entertaining if Patrick were to try to bring it up. I'm pretty sure that would end badly for him. 

P.S. In that tweet above, Patrick is clearly suggesting that he has some sort of surprise lined up for the hearing; he's made that suggestion prior to previous hearings and it always ended tragically for him. But one does have to wonder what he thinks he's discovered that will salvage this situation for him given the clarity and simplicity of the Rule 4.33 legislation. 

P.P.S. It's worth noting that, despite what Patrick thinks, hearings aren't like what he sees on "Matlock" ... there are no sudden surprises or "gotchas", as judges hate that sort of thing. Everything needs to be submitted ahead of time so that opposing parties have the time to examine any filings or pleadings or what have you. So it's not clear what Patrick has in mind based on the above, but I'm fairly sure that he's not going to be springing any surprises on the Court without having first filed it properly with the Court and opposing counsel. Because, despite what Patrick thinks, that's how the law works. 

BONUS TRACK: It's worth demonstrating how badly it ends for Patrick when he shows up in court and tries to make the hearing all about his endless, random grievance fest against me, rather than concentrating on the issue(s) officially before the Court.

After I got my judgment against Patrick in late 2010, I registered that judgment in Alberta, then served Patrick with a motion to produce for me a "Financial Statement of Debtor" (FSOD). He failed to do so and, eventually, we dragged him into a Calgary court on March 6, 2012 to address this very specific issue (failure to produce FSOD), whereupon Patrick -- after being invited to address the Court -- started rambling randomly and incoherently about the Charter of Rights and freedom of expression and conscience and ...

 

 

Note how the judge patiently gives Patrick a minute or so to make an ass of himself, then drags him back to reality by pointing out what the hearing is about. Note how it's not only about how Patrick can't focus on the issue at hand, but he can't even formulate proper, comprehensible sentences, sort of like:

 

 

This snippet is particularly entertaining:

"I don’t actually know if I want to submit this to the Court or not."

Wait, what!? Either you have something you want to put in front of the Court, or you don't; why in the name of Patrick's four-and-a-half chins would you tell the Court that you have some alleged evidence but you haven't decided whether or not you want the Court to see it? And note that that's when the judge had had enough of Patrick's irrelevant free associating grievance fest and dragged him back to unpleasant reality.

It will be interesting to see if Patrick tries the same disassociated free verse at the August 20 hearing, as I guarantee I will be ready for it.

Oh, and it's worth mocking Patrick for advising the judge that he always planned to "appeal the judgement". This is a nonsensical statement since, given that Patrick ignored my Statement of Claim and never even filed a Statement of Defence and that I eventually got a default judgment, well, you can't "appeal" a default judgment. What you can do is file to overturn it, which is a very different thing. The fact that Patrick doesn't understand the difference is telling.

DOUBLE BONUS TRACK: Just to drive home the point I've made a number of times, the hearing for a Rule 4.33 Application addresses a very small number of core issues, and nothing beyond that. I asked Google AI, "What are the issues addressed in a Rule 4.33 Application?", and I got exactly the answer I expected:

 

 

Regarding this case, it's been well over three years of total inactivity, none of the recognized exceptions apply, and there were absolutely no subsequent steps that could have been interpreted as restarting the clock. What "questions" are there beyond that?

Chronicles of Twatrick: Actual legal ruling about Patrick's refusal to pay his debts

Back in 2020 when I got Patrick kicked out of the protection of bankruptcy for refusing to honour his obligations as a bankrupt, in the middle of that ruling, the judge (Justice L. L. Krogan) slapped the fuck out of Patrick verbally by finding that he was a slimy little weasel who clearly had no intention of ever paying his debts:

 

 

You can count on that passage and many others to be placed before the Court next month when I win my Application and go for costs. I'm fairly sure Patrick is not going to enjoy that hearing.

Chronicles of Twatrick: What happens when Patrick commits perjury?

It just occurred to me that, during my upcoming August 20 Alberta "Drop Dead" Rule 4.33 hearing, Patrick will be under oath and it is an absolute guarantee that he is going to lie; that is, commit perjury. It's a given. Patrick lies the way the rest of us breathe. So where does that take us?

As always, let's let Google AI explain the possible consequences once Patrick lies in a civil case in Alberta while under oath:

 

 

Oh, dear, that is a serious set of possible consequences, and since I will get a transcript of the hearing, I guarantee I will be going over it carefully to identify every example of Patrick deliberately misleading the Court.

Oh, I forgot the best part:

 

I'm pretty sure Patrick won't be chowing down on his triple cheeseburgers in prison.

PATRICK'S PREVIOUS PERJURY: Patrick has misled the Court on numerous occasions, and I'll give you just one example here. In 2018, Patrick argued that one of the reasons he never advanced his 2014 bankruptcy appeal (that I also had dismissed for inordinate and inexcusable delay -- see a pattern here?) was that I had "harassed" him in the meantime and that that harassment had been "deleterious" to his ability to proceed (see para 10):

 

 

This was a blatant lie, and the judge even called him out on it in the next paragraph by writing,

 "[Patrick's] affidavit focussed on matters which occurred between 2008 and 2010, and does not provide any examples of behaviour that might be characterized as harassment after February 2015."

In short, the judge simply called Patrick a liar and did not believe him. So when it comes to my upcoming August 20 Rule 4.33 hearing, I will be in attendance and noting for the Court every time Patrick lies to the judge.

Chronicles of Twatrick: Get your Webex client ready.

As I have mentioned before, my Rule 4.33 "Drop Dead" Application hearing against massively-indebted, undischarged bankrupt and financial fugitive Patrick "Super Nexus Badass Chick Magnet Quadruple Chin Quintuple Threat" Ross is on the schedule at the Grande Prairie courthouse:

 

 

for the purpose of having the Court dismiss the long-inactive and meritless defamation lawsuit that Patrick filed against me in 2022, then failed utterly to advance in even the smallest way for more than three years, meaning that the Court will -- pursuant to Rule 4.33 -- be required to dismiss it for long delay:

 

 

And the part you're interested in: regular citizens are free to dial in to the Webex link I will supply closer to the date to watch the proceedings.

 

 

So you might want to install and configure a Webex client before then. 

P.S. I was pondering as to whether to mention this, but a couple days ago, I received an email via an anonymous remailer -- no idea of the identity of the sender -- who advised me that he/she had heard that Patrick's plan for this upcoming application hearing is to wait until the day before the hearing, then drop the lawsuit so he doesn't have to show up. Absolutely no evidence was provided to support this claim but, upon analysis, it does sound like the sleazy sort of thing Patrick would do. Let me explain.

Even Patrick has probably figured out that I'm going to win this application -- the rule is so spectacularly simple and straightforward that there's really little Patrick can present in the way of objection. I have the case Procedure Record which shows that there has been absolutely no activity on Patrick's part of any kind to advance this case for well over three years. That's it; that's all I need to place before the Court and it's over, so Patrick's thinking might be, he's going to lose, anyway, why not just wait until the last minute, then drop the case and not have to go through the humiliation? The legal end result would be the same, so why not just skip the crushing embarrassment? But here's Patrick's problem if he does this.

Courts typically have little patience with people who play games like this; that is, to drag out an action until the last minute, then walk away after running up someone else's legal bill. I think this falls under something like "misconduct" or "abuse of process" or something similar. In any event, judges really, really don't like this sort of game-playing, and if this is what Patrick has in mind, I've been advised that it will end very badly for him for at least a couple of reasons.

First, I would almost certainly be granted major costs (if not all of them) if Patrick does this. But playing that kind of game would have consequences beyond just this case, as I would be able to use this in any future legal spats with Patrick to demonstrate his bad faith. And it wouldn't apply just to me. It seems that, if he does this, this demonstration of bad faith or abuse of process could be used by anyone tangling with Patrick in order to show Patrick's sleazy tactics and lack of good faith. In short, if Patrick does this, he will be making it extremely difficult to ever again launch a legal action against someone.

Again, I was provided with no evidence for this anonymous claim but, upon reflection, I actually hope Patrick does this, as it would pretty much finish him in terms of any new legal actions against me or anyone else. I guess we just need to wait and see. 

 

Chronicles of Twatrick: Homework for my loyal followers.

Related to the recent Rule 4.33-related silliness involving Lloydminster's favourite evasive debtor Patrick Ross, before the actual hearing on August 20 (which, again, should be viewable via a Webex link that I plan on publishing beforehand), I could use all of the information I can collect on Patrick's current location, and employment, and assets and so on.

To that end, I am open to anyone who can supply moderately reliable data related to Patrick including (but not limited to):

• current employment status
• current living arrangements, both in Lloydminster and on the road wherever he happens to be working
• current vehicle, and whether it's actually owned by Patrick and in his name
• where he seems to hang out (restaurants, fitness centres, restaurants, ...)
• most importantly, any other assets in his name that people know of

There is no need to email any of the above to me privately; you are encouraged to leave anything you know in the comments section quite publicly where others can see it and perhaps help others to track down even more information on Patrick.

The more information I can collect on Patrick, the more unpleasant will be his hearing on August 20. 

IMPORTANT: Despite how Patrick loves to whine, there is absolutely nothing illegal about driving by Casa Ross in Lloydminster, and taking photos, and noting the vehicles in the driveway, and describing any apparent activity therein in terms of people coming and going and so on. 

If Patrick wants to bitch about the inconvenience of being in massive debt, there's a simple solution for that. Given time, I'm sure it will come to him. 

Chronicles of Twatrick: Happy (belated) interestversary!

In all the excitement of filing my Rule 4.33 Application to kick undischarged bankrupt Patrick Ross's sorry, pasty, cheeseburger-filled ass, I'd completely forgotten that it was 59 months ago that a Saskatchewan judge lowered the boom on Patrick and ruled on how much he owed me at that time:

 

 

And what with that delicious 5% post-judgment interest rate, Patrick should now owe me close to $130,000 (an amount soon to go up noticeably once I win my Application and get a costs award).

And to think it all started so many years ago with Patrick opening his big mouth and daring me to bring it on:

 

 

"Bring it the fuck on," challenged Patrick Ross. And, lo, the fuck was indeed brought.

P.S. Apparently, Patrick is still screeching hysterically at me from his Twitter "outlawtory" account. I am, of course, screenshotting all of it for when it becomes time to put all of it in front of a judge when Patrick insists he just couldn't muster the energy to advance his lawsuit against me for over three years, and I counter with how he certainly found the time to tweet about me on a daily basis.

If Patrick had a lawyer, I suspect that lawyer would be advising Patrick to shut the fuck up. 

Chronicles of Twatrick: How to defend against a Rule 4.33 Application

Since an earlier commenter suggested a couple possible defenses against a Rule 4.33 Application, I once again asked Google AI to list the variety of potential defenses and I verified them against all the reading I've been doing, and I've highlighted the most important part of all of them:

 

 

Now, I want you to examine the full set of possible defenses and identify the common feature of all the highlighted bits. So what's the common feature? Simple:

Every single defense requires something to have already happened.

That is, every one of those possible defenses requires something to have happened before the filing of the Application; there is no possible defense that involves the Plaintiff/Respondent doing something after the fact.

In short, once a Rule 4.33 Application is filed, the only conceivable defenses available to the Plaintiff/Respondent are events or agreements or filings that must have already happened. There is nothing the Respondent can do after the Application is filed that would save them.

Make sense? 

Chronicles of Twatrick: OK, fine, let's talk about limitations.

Since some people might be confused by the legal advice published by undischarged bankrupt and perpetual legal loser and evasive debtor Patrick Ross over on his Twitter "outlawtory" account, I might as well clear things up and explain why Patrick's legal efforts against me are going to end badly for him.

Let's first get Google AI to explain the two types of limitations under Alberta law:

 

 

The first thing to note is that none of the above affects a Rule 4.33 Application in any way. Not at all. Nothing Patrick presents in the way of his weird and inaccurate interpretation of limitations is going to save his current lawsuit from being disemboweled on August 20, so just dismiss that possibility entirely. But if that's the case, what is Patrick blathering about?

It appears that what Patrick is talking about is, once I win my 4.33 Application, he plans on immediately filing a new lawsuit once again accusing me of defamation and/or harassment; in short, starting all over again with a shiny new Statement of Claim accusing me of all the same things he did before. And here's why that's not really going to work for him.

Note first that, of the two limitation periods (two years and 10 years), it is the limitation period that comes first that will be used, so Patrick will be subject to a two-year limitation period for his accusations in this new lawsuit, which is going to really crimp his style since that means that he cannot include any accusations that go back more than two years, which means everything in his original 2022 lawsuit is now ineligible for inclusion in this new lawsuit. So what is his argument? I'm glad you asked.

Here's what Patrick thinks is going to save him -- the notion of "continuous offenses":

 

 

You see, what Patrick is counting on is that while all those original accusations against me in his 2022 lawsuit are now completely out of time, he's counting on the idea that, within the last two years, I have either repeated some of that alleged defamation or perhaps published some new alleged defamation. So if Patrick loses that August 20 hearing (and, yes, he will lose), and files a new lawsuit the next day, all he will have to work with is whatever I've published on my blog going back to August 21, 2024 (precisely two years). That's it -- that's all Patrick will have to work with, and he seems confident that in those last two years, he'll find enough alleged defamation (or harassment, it's never clear what Patrick is suing for) to justify another idiotic lawsuit. (Again, nothing I published more than two years ago can be used in Patrick's new lawsuit.)

So how worried should I be? Frankly, not a lot, since the last two years has been my mostly reporting on Patrick's stupid lawsuit (perfectly legal), and checking in on the comings and goings at Casa Ross (again, legal), and asking people to keep tabs on Patrick (yet again, legal), and so on. I'm absolutely not going to waste my time poring over my last two years of output as that will be Patrick's job; it will be his responsibility to examine all of the last two years of my blog output to find either new alleged defamation, or repeats of older alleged defamation. He will absolutely not be able to go back further than that due to the deadline as defined by Alberta's two-year discoverability period. 

In summary, this appears to be what Patrick is spewing about, so if he wants to crawl over my last two years of bloggy output looking for anything untoward (that is not disqualified by Alberta limitations), he's welcome to it.

P.S. Notice how I (unlike Patrick) actually read the legislation and take the time to understand it? 

Chronicles of Twatrick: The stupid is tiring.

I'm not sure how much longer I'll waste my time responding to Patrick Ross's increasingly unhinged and hysterical screeds over on his Twitter "outlawtory" account, where he is now assuring his 14 regular readers that he is absolutely going to defeat my Rule 4.33 Application. It's unclear how he thinks this is going to happen given my numerous detailed explanations as to how Rule 4.33 works, but I'll summarize it one more time with an added detail that just occurred to me.

Here's Google AI's take:

 

so let's examine my participation in the matter.

As I read it, all I am required to do is establish before the Court that there has been no significant advancement in this case for more than three years. That part is easy -- I downloaded the "Procedure Report" of the case, which lists all events and filings associated with the case and which shows an utter and complete lack of anything happening for over three years. Not just no significant advancement, no advancement whatsoever. And at that point, my job is done -- I am under no obligation to do anything more, because now that I've established the three years of inactivity, the entire burden of contesting this Application falls on Patrick. Fully and completely. So what does that mean?

Well, if Patrick wants to claim that there has been significant advancement, then it falls entirely on him to explain the nature of that advancement, and further explain why it does not appear in the Procedure Record. I need to do nothing in that regard; if Patrick is claiming advancement of any kind, he needs to produce that for the Court.

In the alternative, Patrick can argue that one of the exceptions applies here. But, again, if that's his claim, he needs to produce the paperwork/filings; again, there is nothing for me to do, the burden of proof again falls entirely on Patrick.

In short, there's nothing further for me to do; I filed my Rule 4.33 Application and I provided the Procedure Report showing an absolute lack of progress in this case for over three years; my job is done, and I have no obligation to do anything else. Everything from this point on falls on Patrick to excuse his lack of progress, and he has no right to ask me for anything to help him.

I don't think there's much more I can add to the last couple of weeks, so I guess we just wait for the hearing on August 20 which -- as I have said before -- will be available via Webex and whose link I will provide closer to the date for any interested voyeurs. Then we'll see which of the two of us is correct.