Canadian Court Dismisses £ 50,000 Claim Against Jewish Colonisation Association: Judge Terms Plaint

A one quarter million dollar claim made against the Jewish Colonisation Association, brough before the Canadian Legal authorities, has been dismissed by the Canadian Court, according to information received here by the Central headquarters of the Jewish Colonisation Association.

The claim was made by Mr. Wolf Horn, a Jewish colonist, after he had been expelled by the authorities in Canada from his holding rented to him by the Jewish Colonisation Association. The Canadian Court, in dismissing the case, ordered Horn to pay the costs of the trial.

The Judge, in issuing the verdict, emphasised that Mr. Horn had shown himself to be a man addicted to harsh language, of a quarrelsome character and an ungovernable temper. That he was at heart an agitator is shown by his admission that he was convicted of conspiracy of forging money in his own country in a political matter, that his sentence was appealed but confirmed and was apparently a fugitive from justice when he came to Canada. It is evident he sought power and prominence and had set himself in open defiance to the administration in its relations with their new colonists.

One of the features confronting the Court, the Judge said, is that the testimony of Horn is entirely unreliable. It is contradicted by reliable witnesses. He has contradicted himself quite frequently and besides his contradictions by himself, the proof shows him to be tricky and dishonest.

In the opinion of the court the relationship between the Jewish Colonisation Association and its colonists was special and not entirely like that of lessor and lessee. It was founding a colony; it was not making money out of them; it was helping them, as is shown by its only charging 5 percent, on its advances for equipment in a part of the country where it is of common knowledge that interest rates are extremely high, and in supplying them with feed, grain and seed grain.

The gross and scandalous exaggeration of the damages in the present actions, and the resort to the Criminal law during the pendoncy of the civil actions, on the main point at issue in these civil actions would lead to the belief that Horn was attempting to “squeeze” the Jewish Colonisation Association into a settlement, the court decided.