'We had an expert, and the judge agreed with us that these were fake,' says lawyer representing employer
The Court of King’s Bench of Alberta has ordered a former sales director to pay more than $492,000 in costs after finding he tried to support a multimillion-dollar restricted stock unit (RSU) claim with fabricated evidence.
Justice Lynn Michele Angotti found that Insight Canada Inc. was “substantially successful” in defending wrongful dismissal, RSU and aggravated/punitive damages claims brought by former employee Gordon Rudko, and that his conduct justified an exceptional costs award.
The ruling followed Angotti’s September 2025 trial decision, where she granted Rudko damages for his outstanding bonus payment in the agreed amount but dismissed the remainder of his claims, after finding that he had introduced fabricated documents at trial.
‘Significant misconduct’ with RSUs
The costs ruling of March 10, 2026 focused on what the court called “the most significant misconduct in this litigation”: fabricated RSU documents.
“In a bid to obtain judgment for millions of dollars under the RSU Plan, Mr. Rudko introduced and relied upon several documents that were fabricated or altered in some fashion,” Angotti wrote in Rudko v Insight Canada Inc, 2026.
The size of the costs award is “pretty unusual in a wrongful dismissal context,” says Maurice Dransfeld, partner at McLennan Ross in Edmonton, which represented Insight Canada.
“You wouldn't normally see an award like that if it wasn't for the fake documents that were submitted to the court and then the doubling down at trial by the plaintiff that these were not forged, that these were real,” he says.
“The result was driven by the attempt to mislead the court, in my view.”
‘Inconsistent’ emails about RSUs
According to Dransfeld, the fake documents were emails about RSUs that Rudko claimed he should have received after he declined earlier offerings.
“Those emails basically suggested that he didn't have to manage these RSUs; the company would just put them into his account and they would manage them for him. And when he was ready to cash out, all that money would be there, and he had already achieved a certain amount of equity and profit as a result of the ones that he already had,” says Dransfeld.
This conflicted with the employer’s information that said Rudko had none, plus the content of the emails “was inconsistent with how the program works,” he says.
The individuals named in the emails also denied sending them and the wording in the emails was off.
“The language in how the entire program and the entitlements were being described in these emails was inconsistent with the language and the way that the program works and the units are described,” says Dransfeld.
“For example, in the emails, he's being referred to as a ‘named executive.’ And that's not what he was, and they would have never referred to him as that.”
External expert looks at documentation
When the employer asked for electronic copies to review metadata, they were told none existed because Rudko had only paper versions, according to Dransfeld, “so all the alarm bells are ringing.”
The company then retained an outside expert who determined the documents were forged. Despite that, Rudko went to trial, so the company flew in people from the stock program in the United States to testify, says Dransfeld.
“Anybody who had been listed in these emails gave some evidence. And, of course, we had an expert, and the judge agreed with us that these were fake,” he says. “We cross-examined [Rudko] at trial and said, ‘Hey, you faked this, didn't you?’ And he said, ‘No, these are real.’ And so the judge didn't like that, I think.”
The employer’s witnesses — including the senior HR manager — and records helped counter the fake materials, says Dransfeld.
“The documentation was solid. The recollection of everybody was solid, even though it happened some time ago. It wasn't a huge undertaking, really, to get everybody properly prepared. They did a terrific job.”
Court denounces ‘outrageous’ conduct
The court stressed that the false documents imposed “considerable expense” on Insight Canada, which had to hire both a forensic computer analyst and an accountant — at a cost exceeding $75,000 — along with substantial legal and internal work to rebut them.
“The use of questionable or fake evidence imposes a burden upon the opposing party that it should not have to bear,” the court said.
“An attempt to deceive the court and defeat justice by introducing misleading evidence is one of the most egregious forms of intentional misconduct.”
Adopting Insight Canada’s wording, the judge found that Rudko “engaged in outrageous conduct and fraudulent behaviour by submitting faked documents in the action in an effort to mislead this court and to obtain significant damages.”
As a result, this behaviour “must be formally denounced and actively deterred,” Agnotti said, in looking to “issue a clear message of deterrence, through both the court’s reasons and its award of costs against Mr. Rudko.”
The wrongful dismissal conclusion from 2025 has been appealed, and an appeal is also possible for the costs ruling, says Dransfeld, adding it’s “difficult to do.”
