Robb Tripp reports:
More than 360 people who worked at a federal prison in Kingston will get at least $1,000 each after a precedent-setting, six-year legal fight over a breach of their privacy.
“This has been a long odyssey,” Christopher Edwards, the Kings -ton lawyer who represented staff in a lawsuit said Wednesday.
Correctional Service Canada has agreed to the payments to 366 people whose names appeared on a staff list at Joyceville Institution. The list, which included home addresses, home phone numbers, and the names of spouses, fell into the hands of convicts at the prison in 2003.
This week, a Superior Court judge in Kingston endorsed the deal that puts an end to the class-action lawsuit launched in 2004 by staff. It originally sought $15 million in damages in a novel area where there have been only a handful of cases in Canada.
Read more in the Whig-Standard.
Okay, this was a settlement. Had it gone to court here in the U.S., would they have gotten anything or would the courts have held that risk of future harm is not something that one can put a monetary value on and if there were no unreimbursed expenses due to the breach, well, tough luck?