OUR EXPERTISE IS YOUR BUSINESS

About

Michael began working with Barry Papazian, Alan Heisey and Ben Forrest in 1992. The four of them formed Papazian Heisey Myers as founding partners in 2001.

Experience

• founding partner of the firm
• 40+ years’ experience practicing law in Ontario
• current practice focuses on debt collection and other contract enforcement – which combines the law of contract with commercial litigation strategy and uses the latter as a tool to assist in the settlement of business and non-business contract disputes
• Michael has also developed an ‘urgent’ (or express) litigation practice allowing him to get into Court within days (and sometimes within hours) of being retained, rather than the usual months and months of delay in standard litigation
• urgent or express litigation is a very effective tool when asking the Court to allow an agreement of purchase and sale to close, or to allow a mortgagee to continue with its mortgage enforcement, or to obtain a Mareva injunction locking down a suspect fraudster’s bank accounts and assets
• underlying this somewhat unique focus is Michael’s detailed knowledge of the law of contract formation, contract default, contract enforcement and contract remedies of all kinds stemming from decades of experience involving all aspects of real estate based commercial law, when acting for landlords, tenants, borrowers and lenders
• frequent appearances in Toronto’s Commercial Court have allowed Michael to appreciate the nuances of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act of Canada and to use that legislation to successfully obtain significant payments from bankrupt individuals who have attempted to hide behind bankruptcy protection after improperly dissipating and fraudulently transferring assets to friends, family and business partners
• Michael uses the voting procedures in consumer and business proposals to increase payables to creditors, and has successfully litigated Court approval of proposals to increase recovery to creditors
• written extensively and given seminars explaining the operation and effectiveness of the 'transfer at undervalue' section (96) of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act of Canada

Current Practice

• Michael regularly acts for a major Canadian bank and is one or two lawyers responsible for its residential mortgage enforcement portfolio in Ontario and as well as collecting this institution’s retail indebtedness in Ontario and Western Canada
• Michael has also developed and runs a hugely successful motor vehicle repossession and debt collection practice. He is an expert in the Repair and Storage Lien Act and Towing and Storage Safety and Enforcement Act and is actively identifying and litigating to stop frauds on motor vehicle lessees and lenders
• Michael now represents both private mortgage lenders and real property owners helping both sides with power of sale and foreclosure issues
• Michael also acts for various equipment financiers and assists them in their equipment lease enforcement and collection activities
• Michael has expanded his debt collection practice into the Bankruptcy field and now accepts retainers from Trustees in Bankruptcy
• Michael has unique experience dealing with fraudulent debtors and the implications that has on Bankruptcy Proposals and Bankruptcies in general. Michael manages and strategizes fraudulent litigation actions for creditors and Trustees in Bankruptcy
• Michael has also successfully dealt with OPCA litigants and other 'internet-based debt elimination' individuals including the Freemen of the Land and Anti-Taxers

Education

• York University, Osgoode Hall Law School, North York, Ontario, Canada - 1978
   
• York University - 1997
  Major: Mathematics
   
• University of Western Ontario
  B.S., Bachelor of Science - 1976

Published Works

• Myers, Michael S. and Traub, Walter M. (1987). Primary Security. Real Estate Development and Construction Financing Insight Seminar May 28 – 29, 1987, 66 pages. Retrieved from Insight Educational Services Ltd.
• Myers, Michael S. and Cho, Philip. (2009). Default Judgment – Common Risks and Pitfalls. The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Seminar October, 2009.
• Myers, Michael S. and Papazian, Justin. (2010). Can a Mortgagee-in-Possession Get “Out of Possession”? The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2010.
• Myers, Michael S. (2011). Do You Know How to Advise Your Client When: Your Client Has Judgment for Possession and Needs You to Obtain a Writ of Possession? The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2011.
• Myers, Michael S. (2012). How to Advise Your Client: When Faced with a Repudiation. The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2012
• Myers, Michael S. (2014). How Should a Creditor Respond to a Consumer Proposal? The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2014
• Myers, Michael S. (2016), Debtor-Creditor: Tips for Helping Your Clients Get Paid in a Challenged Economy, The Six-Minute Business Lawyer Seminar June 2016,
• Myers, Michael S. (2016), Debtor-Creditor: What Do I Do When a Debtor files a “Freeman of the Land” Claim or Motion (Sub Nom: “Frivolous or Vexatious Claims and Motions – a Rule 2.1 Primer”)? The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2016
• Myers, Michael S. (2017), Debtor-Creditor: Judicial Expansion of the Concept of Arm’s Length Transactions under the BIA, The Six-Minute Business Lawyer Seminar June 2017 
• Myers, Michael S. (2018), Transfers at Undervalue Under Section 96 of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act – A Primer, The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2018
• Myers, Michael S. and Krygier-Baum, Michael (2019) A Tale of Two Statutes: Balancing the Interests of Spouses and other Creditors at the Crossroads of the Family Law Act and the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act - A Zero Sum Game? 2019 Annual Review of Insolvency Law
• Myers, Michael S. (2020) The New Reality: Mortgage Enforcement and Debt Recovery During the 2020 Covid-19 Pandemic, The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2020
• Myers, Michael S. (2022) Taking Possession of Mortgaged Property: Is Ontario Still a Self-Help Jurisdiction, The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2022
• Myers, Michael S. (2022) A Mortgagee’s Right to Possession of Real Property in Ontario, The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2022
• Myers, Michael S. (2024) Winning Strategies for Case Conferences and Urgent Motions, The Six-Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Lawyer Seminar October, 2024

Representative Cases

• National Bank of Canada v Young, 2002 CanLII 14518 (ON SC)
• National Bank of Canada v Colucci, 2006 CanLII 30746 (ON SC)
• Myers v. Blackman, 2014 ONSC 5226 (CanLII)
• Juhasz Estate v. Cordeiro, 2015 ONSC 1781 (CanLII)
• Mercado Capital v. Qureshi, 2017 ONSC 5527
• Mercado Capital v. Qureshi, 2018 ONCA 711
• National Bank of Canada v. Guibord, 2020 ONCA 677
• National Bank of Canada v. Guibord, 2021 ONSC 5805
• National Bank of Canada v. Guibord, 2021 ONSC 6549
• National Bank of Canada v. Guibord, 2021 ONCA 864
• KLN v. Grant, 2023 ONCA 193
• Chan v Chan, 2023 ONSC 6143
• Chan v Chan, 2024 ONSC 739
• Chen v Huang, 2024 ONSC 6961
• Chen v Huang, 2025, ONSC 940

Representative Clients

• Doka Canada Ltd.
• Westminster Savings Credit Union

Seminars

• Co-chair (since 2009) of the Law Society of Ontario’s "Six Minute Debtor-Creditor and Insolvency Law" seminars
• Speaker at the Law Society of Ontario’s “Six-Minute Business Lawyer Seminar”, June 2016 (Debtor-Creditor: Tips for Helping Your Clients Get Paid in a Challenged Economy)
• Speaker at the Law Society of Ontario’s “Six-Minute Business Lawyer Seminar”, June 2017 (Judicial Expansion of the Concept of Arm’s Length Transactions under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act)