A man honoured by the Burnaby fire department in 2012 for pulling an elderly neighbour from a burning apartment will be allowed to have his day in B.C. Supreme Court as he tries for a third time to sue the owners and managers of the building.
Remigiusz Janus, a former Polish firefighter, waded through thick black smoke on April 16, 2012 to pull his neighbour, Iliya Mochev, from his burning fourth-floor apartment at the Kingsway Court seniors’ residence at 5560 Inman Ave.
Mochev had been cooking when he took a fall and couldn’t get up, according to news reports at the time.
The pot on the stove continued cooking, eventually sparking a fire inside of the small apartment.
Instead of getting out of the building, Janus plunged into the smoke-filled apartment to get Mochev.
“He went in as far as he could and decided to turn back when he couldn’t locate his neighbour. It was then that he stepped on Mr. Mochev, and then he dragged him out and took him down the four floors,” fire department inspector Dave Wensley said at the time.
The fire department honoured Janus with a certificate for the heroic deed, but he told local media outlets in 2012 that he found the temporary accommodations B.C. Housing provided to residents displaced by the fire intolerable and had decided to live for a time in his Volkswagen van.
Janus, now 64, first tried to sue the burned apartment building’s management company – FirstService Residential BC Ltd. – in provincial court in 2014, claiming the firm was guilty of negligence and responsible for smoke-related injuries and the loss of personal property, but a judge dismissed that action, saying it was under the jurisdiction of the Residential Tenancy Branch.
When Janus launched a Residential Tenancy Branch action in 2015 against the management company and the owners of the building, Central Park Citizen Society, however, that case was dismissed because the two-year time limit for filing the claim had elapsed.
After being diagnosed with cancer in September 2015, Janus launched a new suit against the owner and managers in B.C. Supreme Court. He alleges their negligence led to him being exposed to harmful smoke and asbestos dust, as well as to him losing personal belongings and being rendered homeless for a year. His suit seeks damages for past and future income loss and future care costs.
The owners and managers applied to have the case dismissed, in part because the earlier two cases had been dismissed and Janus should have appealed them rather than filing another suit. They also argued the latest suit had been filed too late.
Justice Diane MacDonald disagreed.
In a July 4 ruling, she found Janus’s cancer diagnosis had changed the nature of his claim, rendering the earlier rulings irrelevant.
“With the diagnosis of cancer, the claim, if successful, may well exceed the $35,000 limit under the RTA,” MacDonald stated. “This is also the case with respect to the Small Claims matter.”
She concluded Janus’s suit should be heard.
“To date, the claim has not been heard on the merits,” she stated. “Delay in these circumstances is not sufficient to deny the plaintiff the opportunity to have his case heard on the merits.”
