The Quebec Court of Appeal has ordered Bell ExpressVu to pay over $82 million to Quebecor Inc. subsidiaries Videotron Ltd. and TVA Group Inc. for failing to prevent the piracy of its satellite signal in a ruling that clarifies the application of the business judgment rule.
In a singular ruling that set aside the traditional deference shown to a trial judge’s assessment of damages, the appeal court revised a 2012 lower court decision that ordered Bell to pay approximately $339,000 to Videotron and $262,000 to TVA after it held that the trial judge’s analysis of expert evidence contained a “palpable and overriding error” when calculating the award. Quebecor estimates that the total sum will amount to $137 million including capital, interest and costs, according to a written statement.