Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• Ferrescope Productions Inc. commenced proceedings against Talia Dorsey for unpaid renovation work totalling $69,580, secured by a construction legal hypothec on her property.
• Dorsey filed a counterclaim alleging incomplete and defective work, seeking over $257,500 in damages and the cancellation of the hypothec.
• At issue was whether Dorsey's failure to file her two expert reports by the court-ordered deadline of February 27, 2026 constituted a serious procedural breach under Article 342 of the Code of Civil Procedure.
• Multiple unkept commitments, shifting justifications, and the absence of sworn evidence supporting her delay collectively led the court to conclude that Dorsey had committed a serious breach.
• The court imposed a pecuniary sanction of $1,000 against Dorsey, finding the penalty just and reasonable given that the breach, while serious, fell at the lower end of the scale.
• Automatic dismissal of the counterclaim was refused, as the Court of Appeal has established that a party must first be heard before such a drastic sanction can be imposed.

Facts of the case

Ferrescope Productions Inc. ("Ferrescope") is a construction company that performed major renovation work on a property owned by Talia Dorsey. On April 16, 2025, Ferrescope filed an originating application for forced surrender for sale under judicial authority, alleging that $69,580 remained unpaid for completed renovation work and that it had registered a construction legal hypothec on Dorsey's property to secure that debt. On July 21, 2025, Dorsey filed a defence and counterclaim, denying that any amount was owed on the basis that the work was not completed and was not carried out according to the rules of the art. She further alleged that the defects and deficiencies caused her significant harm, which she valued at over $257,500, and she sought both that amount and the cancellation of the construction legal hypothec.

Procedural background and protocol obligations

Because the parties could not agree on the sequence for filing expert reports and conducting examinations, a case management conference was held on December 15, 2025, presided over by Justice Enrico Forlini. The court established a case management protocol setting out the following key deadlines: Dorsey was to file two expert reports — one on construction deficiencies and non-conforming work, and one on overbilling — no later than February 27, 2026; Ferrescope was to file counter-expert reports no later than April 24, 2026; and both parties were to conduct pre-trial examinations no later than May 29, 2026. The court determined that Dorsey's expert reports would be filed first, as they were the cornerstone of her counterclaim and the trigger for all subsequent procedural steps.

Court's reasoning and analysis

Dorsey did not file her expert reports by the February 27, 2026 deadline and had still not done so by the time of the hearing on May 15, 2026. When Ferrescope's counsel followed up on February 28, Dorsey's counsel offered a series of explanations over the following weeks: a hospitalization before the December conference and again around January 8, a missed calendar entry due to a departing support staff member, a problem with the construction expert requiring the retention of a new one, and a potential issue with the forensic accounting expert. Despite multiple promises to provide firm dates — including a commitment on March 25, 2026 that at least one expert report would be communicated before April 28 — none of those commitments were met, and no explanations were offered for the failures. Dorsey submitted no sworn evidence, from herself or from any expert, to explain the delay or justify the need for a nine-month extension to file reports she had announced since her October 3, 2025 protocol proposal.

The court applied the framework from the Court of Appeal's decisions in Biron c. 150 Marchand Holdings inc., 2020 QCCA 1537, and 9401-0428 Québec inc. c. 9414-8442 Québec inc., 2025 QCCA 1030, which require that a "serious breach" under Article 342 C.p.c. be of a certain gravity, going beyond a mere trivial failing. The court noted that missing a deadline alone would not have constituted a serious breach; however, the combination of repeated unkept promises, incoherent and evolving justifications, and the complete absence of probative sworn evidence to contest the management notice led to the conclusion that Dorsey had committed a serious breach within the meaning of Article 342 C.p.c. The court further noted that by the time of the hearing, five months had elapsed since the December 2025 management conference and the proceedings had not advanced at all. On the question of dismissal of the counterclaim, the court declined to grant an automatic or prospective dismissal order, holding that such a sanction would be contrary to Court of Appeal authority — specifically Lepêcheur c. Girard, 2026 QCCA 640 — which requires that a party be heard and that the surrounding circumstances be examined before a court may deprive a party of the right to present a defence or counterclaim.

Ruling and overall outcome

The court partially granted Ferrescope's management notice. It declared that Dorsey had committed a serious breach in the conduct of the proceedings and ordered her to pay $1,000 to Ferrescope as a pecuniary sanction — noting that while Ferrescope had claimed $5,561.87 (representing the full legal fees incurred between February 27 and May 15, 2026), the sanction under Article 342 C.p.c. is punitive rather than compensatory and must be proportional to the gravity of the breach, which the court placed at the lower end of the scale. The court also declared that should Dorsey fail to file her expert reports by June 30, 2026, Ferrescope would be entitled to apply to the court for dismissal of the counterclaim. Costs were awarded in favour of Ferrescope. The new case management protocol agreed upon by the parties on May 15, 2026 — providing for Dorsey's expert reports by June 30, 2026, Ferrescope's counter-reports by October 1, 2026, and pre-trial examinations in November 2026 — was ratified by the court.