Daughters of man who died in Queen of the North sinking settle for $200,000

The B.C. Supreme Court has disclosed the $200,000 settlement reached between B.C. Ferries and the two young daughters of Gerald Foisy, one of two people who died when the Queen of the North ferry sank in the early morning hours of March 22, 2006.

Brittni Foisy, who was 16 at the time of the tragedy, will receive $76,992 for general and specific damages that include loss of love, guidance and affection, past and future financial support, and inheritance.

Her sister Morgan, who was 13 when their father died, will receive $84,993.

The rest of the settlement covers legal and other costs.

In his reasons for judgment dated August 19, judge Brian Joyce noted that the settlement obtained by the girls’ counsel is “entirely fair and advantageous” to Foisy’s daughters.

It’s worth recalling what the girls’ lawyer Peter Ritchie said when his clients decided to settle the lawsuit because the cost of the trial would have cost them a steep $40,000.

Here is a portion of Ritchie’s statement on January 29:

If one of your loved ones dies because of negligent actions onboard a British Columbia Ferry, don’t go looking for justice in the province of British Columbia. Unless you are wealthy, you won’t be able to afford Court in B.C.

The people of B.C. will never get a chance to hear in Court why or how two people died in the B.C. Ferries disaster in March 2006. Very sadly, two lovely teenage girls from Penticton will never know what happened to their father. Our so-called justice system has let them down.

The two teenagers and their mother did not have the money to pay the exorbitant amounts required by our justice system to fund their trial. The Queen of the North trial scheduled for February 2, 2009, will not happen. Our justice system is unfair to these two girls, and people should be aware what the government has done to us all in B.C.

In all of Canada, it is only the government in B.C. that has passed rules that operate to prevent ordinary people from having access to the Courtroom. Even though ordinary people pay the taxes for the Courts (the physical building, the judges, the sheriffs, and the Court staff, etc.), the B.C. government has erected financial barriers so that non-wealthy folks are kept out of their own Courts. These barriers, in Court case against B.C. Ferries, kept two teenage girls from having their day in Court.

I repeat, there is no other province in Canada where the government impedes access to such a degree as here. In B.C. you will need a pile of money just to rent the courtroom. This unfair rent is euphemistically called “hearing fees”. This trial was estimated to take something like 30 days. This rent would have cost the girls about $15,000.00. Only in B.C. do we have outrageously high jury fees. The two girls also did not have anywhere near the money to pay the government for their so-called “right” to a jury. Jury fees would have cost the girls an additional approximate $25,000.00. For starters, the girls had to come up with approximately $40,000.00 in jury and hearing fees to the government to be able to walk into the courtroom. Nowhere else in Canada is like this.

The B.C. government also demands a host of other fees. For example, when the Writ was date stamped by a clerk at the counter my clients had to pay $208.00. When they asked someone at the Courthouse to put their dead father’s case on a list for a trial, that cost them another $208.00. These expenses and fees levied by the government go on and on as the litigation proceeds. If you are wondering how ordinary people pay for these excessive government fees, the answer is simple. They don’t. Maybe the B.C. government expected these girls to raise money by doing more baby-sitting? Maybe they should have held a bake sale at their Penticton high school?