What do you do when an elderly physician, in poor health and under enormous debt whose registration is suspended continues to practise medicine despite multiple court injunctions? This is what a Quebec court had to deal with in Collège des médecins du Québec c. Giannakis, 2020 QCCS 4216 (CanLII), http://canlii.ca/t/jc298. The evidence of contempt of court was overwhelming including a half-hour video recording of his assessing and treating an undercover investigator posing as a patient. The recording undermined his position that his poor understanding of the French language prevented him from understanding the orders made against him. In addition, his disrespect for the process was further demonstrated by his failure to show up in court for the second day of the hearing without notifying any of the other hearing participants. Despite finding a deliberate and intentional breach of the court orders, the Court in this case did not conclude that imprisonment was necessary and proportional. Rather it ordered the payment of $24,000 of fines over a 25-month period. Justice is usually not easy and is rarely neat.
A Judicial Warning
Courts rarely give warnings to regulators about future potential problem areas. Courts tend to decide individual matters on specific facts. However, in Welkoff v. Ontario