British Columbia: A Victoria hair salon is filing a class-action lawsuit against the California-based producer of Brazilian Blowout, the anti-frizz hair treatment, which, stylists say, is popular in the humid B.C. capital. The suit followed a warning by Health Canada that the hair-smoothing solution contained over 11 per cent more formaldehyde than is allowed in Canadian cosmetics. Contact with excessive doses of formaldehyde can cause breathing troubles and burning eyes, nose and throat. Brazilian Blowout insists Health Canada’s tests improperly measured the substance.
Saskatchewan: Pepper spray may be among the culprits in the death two years ago of a 43-year-old Regina man who had a fatal cardiac arrest while in police custody. His wife is now suing the City of Regina and the Regina Police Service; her lawyer argues the death occurred as a “direct result” of excessive use of force at the time of the arrest, which included police pepper-spraying the man. The allegations still have to be proven in court.
Manitoba: A Winnipeg man is seeking over $270,000 in damages from Canad Inns-Grand Forks Inc., and a Texas-based designer of waterslides after his ride down one such slide allegedly landed him headfirst into a shallow pool. The man said he was going down a one-person tube when the slide flipped, and that the accident left him with “severe and permanent physical injury,” such as chronic headaches and hearing disorders, missing out on a job promotion, and over $10,000 in medical bills. Canad Inns has not yet filed a statement of defence.
Ontario: After being stabbed with scissors and hit over the head with a hammer by two teenage girls, a Windsor cab driver is suing the city for $2 million for allegedly failing to enforce its own security regulations. (Both attackers have pleaded guilty to assault and robbery.) Only about three months earlier, Windsor had passed a bylaw requiring all cabs to carry a security camera, but this cab “slipped under the radar,” the plaintiff’s lawyer claimed. The cab company is also named in the suit.