Proposed Danforth Shooting Class Action Against Smith & Wesson Relating To Authorized User Technology Allowed To Proceed

• Published date: 18 February 2021
• Law Firm: Gardiner Roberts LLP
• Author: Mr James Cook

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice has dismissed a motion by Smith & Wesson Corp to throw out a potential class action for negligent manufacturing of the firearm used in a mass shooting in Toronto: Price v. Smith & Wesson Corp., 2021 ONSC 1114.

In July 2018, a loan gunman shot and killed two people on a busy street in Toronto and injured several others in a notorious incident known as the "Danforth Shooting." The firearm used in the shooting was a Smith & Wesson handgun which had been reported stolen in 2015 by a gun dealer in Saskatchewan.

The plaintiffs ' victims of the shooting and their family members ' subsequently commenced an action against Smith & Wesson for negligence relating to the design, manufacturing and/or distribution of the firearm, as well as strict liability and public nuisance. The action has not yet been certified as a class proceeding.

In 2020, Justice Paul M. Perell heard a preliminary motion to determine whether the proposed causes of action met the first stage of the certification test under the Class Proceedings Act, 1992. Concurrently, Smith & Wesson brought a motion to have the plaintiffs' action dismissed on the basis that it failed to disclose a reasonable cause of action pursuant to Rule 21 of the Rules of Civil Procedure.

In a proposed class proceeding, in determining whether the pleading discloses a cause of action, no evidence is admissible, and the material facts pleaded are accepted as true, unless patently ridiculous or incapable of proof. The pleading is read generously, and...