In late 2021 the Supreme Court of British Columbia released its Reasons for Judgment following the trial of a civil lawsuit brought by a woman whose husband had physically attacked her in 2018. Her most serious injuries included a broken nose, a concussion/mild traumatic brain injury [one wonders whether any brain injury can be said to be "mild," but that's a discussion for another day], and post-traumatic stress disorder. The total award, not including "court costs" (an amount to at least partly reimburse the successful party in a lawsuit for its legal fees and expenses), was nearly $800,000 (most of which was compensation for past wage loss and for anticipated future wage loss, given that the woman was a high-income individual before the incident and was left with lingering impairment to her future income-earning potential as a result of her injuries).
One striking fact about this case is that the husband pleaded guilty earlier in criminal court to charges arising from this event. His sentence in criminal court was an absolute discharge.
This case demonstrates the different approaches to claims of this nature in criminal court as compared to civil court.
I suspect that the husband in this case has sufficient assets to justify the claimant pursuing the lawsuit in the first place. If the husband had been of modest means and had little or no chance of being able to pay any significant amount towards this approximately $800,000 judgment against him now or in the future, the claimant would have had to make a very hard cost-benefit decision when deciding whether it was worthwhile to pursue her civil claim in the first place. One point in the claimant's favour is that civil judgments like this survive a bankruptcy; in other words, the husband can't simply make an assignment into bankruptcy in the hopes of having the judgment against him discharged in due course.
UPDATE on June 14, 2022: The judgment is under appeal. While the ultimate outcome may change as a result of the appeal, the cost-benefit factors to be considered by this or any similar plaintiff remain the same. I'll update this post once I learn of the outcome of the appeal.
