Dear Supporters,
Many of you probably predicted that I would not be saying this today, but this message is not a dream: You came up with yet another $100,000 payment — now making a total of $400,000 provided to the Arvay team.
In the last twelve days you actually donated more than $40,000 — an amazing achievement for small donors. This accomplishment proves to all those people who want us to fail — that we are very determined.
You gave until it hurt and then you gave a lot more. It’s hard not to get teary-eyed over the generosity of our supporters, who have come through every time.
We know that the pace of your litigation is painfully slow, and this is unfortunately as expected. The Government will continue to do its best to slow down the process, but we now have the assistance of a case management judge to help keep the process moving more fairly.
We filed in August 2014 and it has taken a very long time (one year) before we are finally into a (summary) trial (August 4-5, 2015). We cannot predict the outcomes of this trial, based on only part of our arguments and, with your continued support, we will prepare for all possibilities.
[Happy birthday Gwen!]
Thank you for your trust,
Stephen Kish,
ADCS-ADSC Chair,— on behalf of Plaintiffs Ginny and Gwen, their families, and the ADCS-ADSC Directors
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Chers amis et donateurs,
Certains d’entre vous avaient probablement pensé que je ne pourrais pasvous annoncer une si bonne nouvelle aujourd’hui. Mais voilà : ensemble, nous avons réussi à ramasser un autre montant de 100 000 $, ce qui fait un total de 400 000 $ à remettre à l’équipe de MeArvay.
Dans les 12 derniers jours seulement, vous avez donné plus de 40 000 $, un exploit tout à fait extraordinaire pour des « petits donateurs ». À tous ceux qui souhaitent nous voir échouer, cette réussite prouve que nous sommes des plus déterminés. Et que nous réussirons.
Vous avez donné jusqu’à ce que ça fasse mal, puis vous avez donné encore. Difficile de rester insensible devant une si grande générosité.
Nous sommes bien conscients du fait que notre litige avance de façon péniblement lente. Malheureusement, tout ça est normal. Le gouvernement continue à ralentirle processus, mais on nous a maintenant attitré un juge responsable de la gestion de notre dossier qui veillera à ce que le processus progresse de façon plus juste.
En août 2014, nous avons engagé une poursuite contre le gouvernement canadien. Près d’un an plus tard, nous avons enfin la date pour notre procès sommaire : les 4 et 5 août 2015. Impossible de prévoir le dénouement de ce procès, basé uniquement sur une partie de nos arguments juridiques. Mais avec votre appui, nous serons prêts pour toutes les possibilités.
(Bonne fête, Gwen !)
Au nom de nos deux plaignantes, Ginny et Gwen, de leurs familles et des directeurs de l’ADCS-ADSC, je vous remercie de votre confiance.
Stephen Kish,
Président de l’ADCS-ADSC
Thank you for the updated time estimate for the response to discovery.
I’ll leave it to Mr. Arvay to assess whether the delay is reasonable. I was objecting earlier to the delay in estimating the length of the delay–which didn’t seem at all reasonable to me. I’m glad we at least have a time frame put on the table and look forward to hearing of Mr. Arvay’s next move, perhaps by next week.
What, the government needs that much time to review mountains of paper to find the relevant documents they supposedly used in implementing the IGA?
Passing laws THEN looking for the justification to support them?
With that many documents (100,000!) you’d almost think they are looking through the U.S. tax code but a foreign country’s rules and regs cannot justify actions taken here in Canada. While they are doing all this looking harm is being done, so it’s good to know Mr. Arvay has a strategy.
Cute photo of “refugee” Gwen and her brother. After the big betrayal, when everyone was talking about being second-class citizens, I said I felt like an alien in my own country. Maybe I’m more like a refugee and Canada has proven it has no interest in providing me refuge.
Lucky for the Canadian government to not be subject to IRS penalties for their delay, eh?
It is a clear “snow job” The government is stalling and trying to overwhelm Joe’s so they will overlook issues with the charter etc. Isn’t it nice to know YOUR tax dollars are going for this? How many papers did they “find” to try to screw the veterans of this country? My brother was a captain in the RCAF and is retired from duty. He has a neck injury from a flight maneuver that went wrong in his career. I wonder if they will screw him too….
My apologies to Ginny. I thought the cute photo was Gwen. Must read more carefully. It’s tough to be accused of being a “US person for tax purposes” while your sibling escapes the charges. No family should be split like this.
An interesting perspective on the modern world. http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/columns/The-Islamic-State–Obama-doth-protest-too-much_18407966
Yet another reason why the world is going to stop buying US products and services over the coming years:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2956058/Russian-researchers-expose-breakthrough-U-S-spying-program.html
Now this looks like a class action law suit in the making ! Against all the Disk Drive Manufacturers and the US Government.
@Ellendownunder
Well spotted. I keep on running across articles giving the wrong advice, too. I wonder if they could be put to use somehow to show that even financial “experts” are still giving bad advice.
“The Government now advises that it will need “likely sometime in summer” to process “over 100,000” documents possibly relevant to the case.”
Over 100,000 documents! They can’t all be against our case. They must be looking for the few needles in a monstrous haystack that they think will help them.
We don’t finish fund-raising until early summer, right? I didn’t expect the lawsuit to start before that anyways. All this stalling . . . maybe the cons won’t be in gov’t when our case is heard. (Of course, maybe the cons will still have a majority gov’t after the election, but let’s hope not.)
About those 100,000 documents. Please, Mr. Pentney, allow me to help. I’ve got a shredder. Problem solved. Now let’s get this case into court because time’s a-wastin’ and there are people in harm’s way and the longer this drags on more’s the harm that comes their way.
I’m sure Mr. Arvay has a much better strategy but I couldn’t resist offering my “assistance”. 😉
@Jan
“Over 100,000 documents! They can’t all be against our case.”
The point of discovery, as I understand it, isn’t to give one side time to hide all evidence except that small amount that is helpful to them. It is to legally compel one side (in this case the government) to reveal all evidence to the other side (in this case our side) to allow their lawyer–in this case Arvay–to draw their own conclusions as to what is or is not helpful or relevant.
The point is NOT to shred the documents but to allow Arvay the chance to search for the needle in the haystack that benefits OUR side. Not an easy task for Arvay of course. That is part of why it costs $500,000.
Or do I misunderstand the way the legal process works?
@EmBee:
Yeah!! Just how I feel , too. Shredders R Us!!-
Translation: we need a delay so we can document dump and it will take your team weeks just to thread through the paper snow job just to come up with the few relevant documents that actually are pertinent!
It was clear from the Senate Finance Committee meeting that the Conservatives were taking their marching orders from both the Banks and the sneaky little B**t*ards whispering in their ears the propaganda line.
They completely ignored Lynne Swanson, Allison Christians and Dr. Cockfield as well as John Richardson, not to mention all the amendments, well thought out and presented by both Liberal, NDP and Green. Just a stone wall of negative. And it was clear that they were NOT listening. Not to one word any of them had to say and they said a LOT!
Word is that the US Admin has working operatives both in Israel and Canada to defeat Netanyahu and Harper.
There is NO confidence that either the libs or ndp would do any different because on scrutiny it appears no matter who we elect, they take their orders from other than the electorate.
All the more reason , in my view, for the lawsuit to go forward as quickly as humanly possible.
it seems that there is a reasonable time for producing documents for discovery and the time frame the government has posed is not justifiable regardless of their claims of the number of documents they need to produce for ‘possible’ relevance.
What, exactly is the remedy for that?
I think I would be tempted to say to the government, take all the time you like producing your so called documents within the parameters of time allowed by the court.
In the meantime, perhaps our team could go for an immediate permanent injunction .
When the gov are ready, have at it.
In the meantime, an injunction would save from harm any and all under the articles of the Charter.
That includes Canadian Citizens and Permanent Residents of Canada.
I do not know what our team will do or is contemplating doing but
I do know this :
This lawsuit will be fully funded by all concerned parties and would be funded even if it were twice the cost.
It is THAT important to the nation. This nation and all nations who value their sovereignty and their individual freedom!
@FuriousAC
I would MUCH rather they document dump than shred evidence. In a case like this where we all agree that all the evidence can only support our side–and I assume we agree on this–I’d rather have more evidence than less evidence on the table even if it takes a little longer to sort through. But I’ve always favoured an injunction to block implementation while the evidence is sorted through.
The government has now provided an estimate of the size of the task and the time it will take. I do not know whether those estimates are reasonable or not and will defer to Mr. Arvay on what to do regarding strategy for the timing. But I don’t think we should be seen as thwarting the discovery process. The whole point of discovery is to uncover evidence supporting our side.
@Dash1729
Put another way: now that the government has said there are 100,000 documents I definitely want our side to see all 100,000 documents without anything being shredded. Let Mr. Arvay, not the government, decide what can be ignored. If we can get the documents sooner than the summer I’d be in favour of that too. But no way should we not find out what is in those documents.
With regards to the Butera complaint about the $2,350 renunciation fee:
“Whereas the right of expatriation is a natural and inherent right of all
people, indispensable to the enjoyment of the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit
of happiness … Therefore any declaration, instruction, opinion, order, or decision
of any officer of the United States which denies, restricts, impairs, or questions
the right of expatriation, is declared inconsistent with the fundamental principles
of the Republic.” 15 Stat. 223; R.S. § 1999; 8 U.S.C.A. 1481 notes.”
The same argument should be used against the exit tax.
@Dash:
You missed the entire point of Shredders R Us.
We agree completely, you just took the reverse inference from what I said.
Meaning, Give our team ALL documents. And do it ASAP. ( I have to assume the court has a timeline beyond which neither party may go, but what I don’t know what kind of time line that is nor what penalties are incurred if they don’t comply within the court’s determination.)
Guaranteed once gone through most will be headed for the shredder, their irrelevance made clear. At least that is my opinion. There is another aspect as well. Within all those documents may well be a gem the gov overlooks and becomes an important peg in our case.
Of course we are all anxious for some kind of idea of the move forward and just what is going on. Even though we rely on Stephen to update us it always seems very little and we thirst for more.
But this IS the nature of the thing. Things move slowly and most unsatisfactorily so when lives are hinged to possible outcomes and actual outcomes.
Ummm … I was kidding about the shredding. I just wanted to reduce their workload so they can get on with it. If there’s a “gem” for the plaintiffs in that pile of paper then it must be searched for. However, I worry that while they (the defendants) dither, harm will be done to the plaintiffs and everyone else sailing in the same boat as they are in. IF an injunction was possible that would give them all the dither time they require but meanwhile the FATCA reporting would be on hold and harm would be averted. That being the case then they (the defendants) would likely want to get to court as fast as possible because they wouldn’t want the banks to be placed in a tough spot … the spot the Harper gov’t likes to keep reserved for its citizens.
FWIW … 100,000 documents, if each were only 1 page long, would form a pile of paper around 35 feet high.
@All,
A problem on this site is that litigation updates get lost in this post, which I revise almost very day, and are effectively lost in the comments section as well. So, with the help of @Pacifica, we now have a continually revised “LITIGATION UPDATES” page which can be accessed through a link on the top right of this website, and through a link that I will always have on this post.
The updates listed will be some key past updates, and new actions that we plan to take with very roughly estimated timelines. Updates will be reviewed when necessary with Mr. Arvay before posting. We will post updates when we can and when the updates do not provide information that the opposition should not have.
There will be no comments on the LITIGATIONS UPDATES page. This is just a simple list of updates. However, @Schubert and @Petros posted comments before the comment feature could be disabled, with @Petros briefly commenting on Canada’s highest profile US tax attorney, Mr. Roy Berg.
@FuriousAC
“And do it ASAP”
Yes I agree that if they are going to do a document dump to do it sooner rather than later.
@Stephen Kish
Thank you for creating the “Litigation Updates” thread. Of course the ideal place for that would be the separate ADSC-ADCS page (http://www.adcs-adsc.com) but that page has never really taken hold as a popular place to post so a separate thread here is the next best thing.
Is there any reason why Joe Arvay cannot request an injunction?
The government’s delay should be good enough justification for doing so.
Injunctive relief is appropriate to prevent an action, to put a stop to ongoing or repeated conduct that violates a person’s rights or causes injury, or to force a defendant to take action in order to prevent harm.
Injunctive relief is generally considered a legal remedy of last resort, so when you file a lawsuit you must show that you need the injunction because no other remedies are adequate for your situation either because the subject of the lawsuit is unique or money is not enough to deter bad behavior.
Essentially, you must show that an irreparable harm will occur if the injunction is not granted.
Even without the delay, an injunction is a no brainer. Once the data is transferred, irreparable damage is done. The people whose data is transferred are at risk.
I have donated before, but unless I know that the legal team is actually going to do everything to protect US persons i.e. ask for an injunction to not send data until this issue is resolved, I won’t donate anymore.
@noinjunctionnodonation
I fully agree with your position for both the ADSC lawsuit as well as the Bopp lawsuit.
No injunctions, no more donations!
Obama is trying to undermine the reasons for granting injunction(s) — Sneaky bastard he is.
@WhiteKat, are you reading this?