B.C.’s highest court has dismissed an appeal from a man who was responsible for one of the largest investment frauds in the province’s history. Earle Douglas Pasquill owes the B.C. Securities Commission $36.7 million and has not paid a cent of that penalty since it was imposed more than a decade ago. Earlier this week, the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled that Pasquill’s Life Income Fund accounts are not exempt from the BCSC’s collection efforts, upholding a ruling made in B.C. Supreme Court in December 2024. Pasquill had argued that the payments he receives from the retirement accounts were not covered under amendments to the Pension Benefits Standards Act that were made in 2023. Those amendments were intended to enhance the BCSC’s ability to collect penalties it is owed by specifying that “any payment in the series of payments that constitutes a pension” could be captured “by a preservation order or a forfeiture order” under the Securities Act. In 2020, the BCSC sought a freeze order for Pasquill’s LIF accounts under the PBSA, but lost a court battle when Pasquill made essentially the same argument—that retirement funds are exempt from seizure under that law. This time around, after the 2023 amendments, the court sided with the BCSC. Writing for the three-judge panel, Justice Peter H. Edelmann considered a variety of versions of Pasquill’s argument, including that the funds had already been found exempt in the previous decision and that they did not qualify as “payments” under the amended legislation. The court rejected the first suggestion by noting that the previous decision dealt with the regulator’s attempt to freeze and seize the contents of the accounts, while its latest efforts focused on payments coming out of the accounts. As for whether the payments met the definition of that word, Edelmann considered Pasquill’s argument that they could be deemed “benefits” or transfers under different sections of the legislation, but found they were clearly “payments.” Pasquill and another man—Michael Patrick Lathigee—jointly directed and controlled the “Freedom Investment Club,” which fraudulently raised $21.7 million from 700 investors in 2008, according to the BCSC. A panel of the commission imposed a $15 million administrative penalty on Pasquill in 2015 and banned him from B.C.’s financial markets for life. He and Lathigee were also ordered to pay $21.7 million, representing their ill-gotten gains from the fraud. As of 2024, Pasquill’s LIF accounts held slightly more than $550,000, according to the appeal court decision. “Any payments the BCSC receives from them will be made available to victims of the fraud,” the regulator said in a news release Thursday.
