Bennett Jones
Ashley Paterson has a commercial litigation practice that focuses on class action litigation, product liability litigation, consumer protection litigation and other complex corporate disputes.
Ashley has experience in motions, applications, trials and appeals before both Ontario courts and tribunals and the Supreme Court of Canada.
Ashley has worked on several particularly influential cases, including recently successfully defeating certification on behalf of the defendants in a proposed multiple-model product liability class action. The decision was one of the few matters in the practice area in Ontario in which certification was denied. She has also acted for defendants in product liability cases related to allegedly defective automobile airbags, gear shifters, printer paper, electrical power bars, guardrails, pharmaceutical products and also in multiple cases involving allegedly defective medical products such as surgical mesh and inferior vena cava filters.
Much of Ashley's work is international in scope and she frequently works with clients facing cross-border litigation.
Ashley was recently ranked as the “Associate to Watch” in the category of Litigation: Products Liability by Chambers & Partners (2019). In addition to her practice, Ashley regularly speaks and writes in the above-noted areas. Most recently, she spoke at the 2018 MedTech Summit in Brussels on a panel with international product liability counsel. She also recently gave a presentation at the American Bar Association Women in Litigation Joint Conference entitled The Global Courtroom: Strategies for Managing Cross-Border Product Liability Litigation. Ashley has published extensively in the above-noted areas, both at the international level (recently being published in the International Comparative Legal Guide to Product Liability for a paper entitled Product Liability Class Actions in Canada) and locally (recently being published in The Advocates' Journal for a paper entitled "The Quintessentials of Product Liability Class Actions").