Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• Scope and legality of an interlocutory injunction restraining allegedly defamatory communications by a self-represented shareholder against a real estate investment trust and its trustees.
• Threshold for granting permission to appeal an interlocutory injunction judgment under article 31 C.p.c., including whether the order decides part of the dispute or causes irreparable harm.
• Degree of appellate deference owed to the Superior Court’s discretionary decision to grant interlocutory injunctive relief in a defamation context.
• Application of proportionality and “interest of justice” principles to requests for interlocutory appeals, especially where issues can be fully revisited at trial on a complete factual record.
• Balancing of reputational protection for BTB Real Estate Investment Trust and its fiduciaries against the defendant’s ability to communicate with market participants and publish online content.
• Treatment of injunctive orders compelling removal of past internet publications that allegedly harm the reputation of a public real estate investment vehicle and its governance actors.

Facts of the case

Behrak Shahriari is a self-represented individual who had been engaging in extensive communications concerning BTB Real Estate Investment Trust (BTB), a public real estate investment vehicle, and the individuals acting as its trustees. Those communications were addressed not only to BTB and its internal stakeholders but also to a range of external market actors, including analysts, transfer agents, business partners, and financial institutions. BTB and its trustees alleged that Mr. Shahriari’s statements were defamatory and damaging to their integrity and reputation, giving rise to a defamation proceeding before the Superior Court of Québec.

The persons named as plaintiffs (and later respondents in the Court of Appeal) include multiple trustees of BTB Real Estate Investment Trust: Michel Léonard, Jocelyn Proteau, Sylvain Fortier, Armand Des Rosiers, Christine Marchildon, Luc Martin, Sylvie Lachance, Lucie Ducharme and Jean-Pierre Janson, each in their capacity as trustee of BTB. The thrust of their complaint was that Mr. Shahriari’s written and online communications, as well as his outreach to market participants, constituted a sustained reputational attack on BTB and its fiduciaries in the context of a listed real estate investment trust.

Interlocutory injunction before the Superior Court

In the underlying action, the plaintiffs sought interlocutory injunctive relief to restrain Mr. Shahriari’s ongoing communications while the defamation case progressed. On 17 December 2025, the Superior Court (Castonguay J.) granted an interlocutory injunction in favour of BTB and its trustees, in a judgment cited as Léonard c. Shahriari, 2025 QCCS 4583.

The Superior Court’s order imposed several substantive restraints on Mr. Shahriari’s conduct pending final judgment. First, he was ordered to cease communicating, directly or indirectly, with BTB, its trustees, management and personnel, except through BTB’s designated counsel (three named lawyers from Stikeman Elliott) and then only in connection with BTB-related matters, without copying anyone else. Second, he was enjoined from transmitting to any person—particularly market analysts (including ISS and Glass Lewis), BTB’s transfer agent Computershare, and BTB’s business partners such as brokers, analysts and staff of the National Bank of Canada—any written or other communications that impugned the integrity or reputation of BTB, its trustees, management or staff.

Third, the Court ordered him to stop publishing any statements, on any medium, that called into question the integrity or reputation of BTB, its trustees, management or employees. Finally, he was compelled to remove all publications, documents or statements he had posted on the internet that harmed the reputation of BTB or its fiduciaries, including all content he had placed on LinkedIn, Stockhouse and YouTube, with particular reference to items enumerated in an annex to the plaintiffs’ written argument. The injunction was expressed to remain in force “until final judgment” in the defamation case, effectively regulating his speech throughout the pendency of the proceedings.

The Superior Court further dispensed the plaintiffs from posting security, authorized service of the order outside normal business hours to Mr. Shahriari’s email address, and ordered provisional execution of any judgment to be rendered in the proceeding notwithstanding appeal. Costs were also awarded in the plaintiffs’ favour at first instance.

Application for leave to appeal

Unrepresented, Mr. Shahriari applied to the Québec Court of Appeal, invoking article 31 of the Code of Civil Procedure (C.p.c.) and seeking permission to appeal the interlocutory injunction judgment. His request was heard by Healy J.A. in Montréal (2026 QCCA 91). This was not a full appeal on the merits; instead, it was a threshold question of whether he should be allowed to challenge the interlocutory injunction order at this stage.

Article 31 C.p.c. restricts appeals from interlocutory judgments, requiring a party to obtain leave where the intermediate order either decides part of the dispute or causes an irreparable injury. The legislative and jurisprudential policy is that appeals should normally wait until a final judgment has been rendered, to avoid fragmenting proceedings and overburdening appellate courts with piecemeal challenges. Leave to appeal from an interlocutory decision is therefore characterized as exceptional.

In this framework, the appellant had to persuade the Court of Appeal that the interlocutory injunction effectively determined an essential part of the defamation dispute, or that the order inflicted irreparable harm justifying appellate intervention before trial. Additionally, even if those criteria were arguably met, the Court still retained discretion to deny leave where an appeal would not serve the interests of justice or would be disproportionate in light of the overall litigation.

Court of Appeal’s analysis

Healy J.A. began by recalling that permission to appeal from an interlocutory judgment is granted sparingly because it is an exception to the general rule that appellate review comes only after a final judgment putting an end to the proceedings. The Court emphasized that such permission may be granted if the interlocutory judgment (a) decides part of the dispute or (b) causes irreparable injury to the applicant. The judge also underlined that, beyond these statutory gateways, the Court must be satisfied that granting leave accords with the interests of justice and the guiding principles of civil procedure.

The decision referred to existing Court of Appeal jurisprudence, including Procureur général du Québec c. Gaspé Énergies inc. and Allianz Global Risks US Insurance Company c. SNC-Lavalin inc., which stress that the judge considering a leave application must weigh both the chances of success and proportionality of the proposed interlocutory appeal. In particular, the judge must determine whether the questions raised are central enough to advance the first-instance proceedings or are instead of secondary importance, better left to be addressed, if at all, in an appeal from final judgment.

Specific to interlocutory injunctions, the Court reiterated that leave to appeal is “exceptional.” It highlighted several key considerations: first, the grant or refusal of an interlocutory injunction is a discretionary decision of the trial judge, which commands deference on appeal. Second, such an order is inherently temporary, lasting only while the main action is pending and not binding the trial judge on the merits, who will have the benefit of a complete evidentiary record. Thus, even where a motions judge uses language about a “clear right,” this is understood as a preliminary assessment and does not, by itself, decide the substantive dispute.

Applying these principles, Healy J.A. concluded that the injunction order did not decide the defamation claim in any definitive sense. The order was explicitly interlocutory and set to endure “until final judgment” in the ongoing case. The trial judge remained free to revisit the underlying issues on a full record, including the truth or falsity of the statements and the presence of any defences such as fair comment or responsible communication on matters of public interest. Consequently, the order did not determine any part of the merits in a way that would justify an interlocutory appeal.

The Court further held that the injunction did not inflict irreparable prejudice within the meaning of article 31 C.p.c. While the order undoubtedly restricted Mr. Shahriari’s ability to communicate about BTB and its trustees in certain forums and obliged him to remove online content, those effects were framed as temporary safeguards pending trial. They did not amount to a non-recoverable prejudice that could not adequately be addressed by the final judgment, including through eventual appellate review of the whole case. In balancing interests, the Court also weighed the reputational harm alleged by BTB and its trustees against the burdens on the defendant, and concluded that the interests of justice and procedural proportionality did not favour opening the door to an interlocutory appeal.

Outcome and implications

On this analysis, the Court of Appeal dismissed Mr. Shahriari’s application for leave to appeal. The interlocutory injunction issued by the Superior Court therefore remains in force until the defamation action is resolved on its merits. Practically, this means that BTB Real Estate Investment Trust and its trustees have secured ongoing interlocutory protection against the communications and publications they allege are defamatory, while the underlying dispute proceeds through the ordinary trial process.

The successful parties in the Court of Appeal are the respondents—BTB Real Estate Investment Trust (acting through its trustees) and the individual trustees named in their representative capacities. The Court’s formal disposition rejects the motion for permission to appeal from the 17 December 2025 Superior Court judgment, with costs against Mr. Shahriari. However, the decision does not specify any concrete dollar figure for damages, costs, or other monetary relief at this stage. Accordingly, while BTB and its trustees prevailed procedurally and obtained an award of costs in principle, the total monetary amount ordered in their favour cannot be determined from this decision.