Governor General David Johnston announced 66 new appointments to the Order of Canada on Dec. 30, 2011.

David W. Scott

There are five lawyers in the group of new appointees including former prime minister Paul Martin Jr., who has bee accorded to the highest honour of Companion of the Order. Martin was called to the Ontario bar in 1966 and has spent most of his career in business and politics.

The Order of Canada is one of Canada’s highest civilian honours. It was established in 1967 during Canada’s centennial year to recognize a lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication to community and service to the nation. There are three areas of appointment: companion, officers and members

Daphne Dumont Photo: Gail J. Cohen

Recipients will be invited to accept their insignia at a ceremony to be held at a later date.

Officers

David W. Scott has been made an officer of the Order of Canada for his contributions to the legal profession and for his charitable activities. Scott is is co-chairperson of Borden Ladner Gervais LLP and Counsel in the Ottawa office. He was called to the Ontario bar in 1962 and is certified by the Law Society of Upper Canada as a specialist in civil litigation. He was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1976 and has been honoured with awards from many legal associations in Canada and is well known for his pro bono work. He is also a former LSUC bencher.

Members

Aaju Peter Photo: Gail J. Cohen

Charlottetown family lawyer Daphne E. Dumont, a former president of the Canadian Bar Association, has been named a member of the Order of Canada for her contributions as a lawyer and volunteer with various legal associations. Dumont earned her law degree at Oxford University in 1976, becoming the first woman admitted to study law at any of the Oxford men’s colleges. She served on the national task force on gender equality in the legal profession with former Supreme Court justice Bertha Wilson and also worked for five years on a CIDA-funded development project to introduce civil legal aid to rural China. She was called to the P.E.I. bar in 1978 and is a partner in Macnutt & Dumont.

Mary Margaret Hetherington of Calgary, Alta. has been recognized for her pioneering achievements as a woman in law and for her work in northern communities. Hetherington has been a judge for the courts of appeal in Nunavut and Alberta and is highly regarded for breaking new ground in the field of alternative dispute resolution.

Aaju Peter is a lawyer and clothing designer in Iqaluit, Nunavut. She is honoured for her contributions to the preservation and promotion of Inuit culture and language. Peter was born and raised in Greenland, and moved to Iqaluit in the early 1980s. She is a mother of five and is a graduate of the ground-breaking Akitsiraq Law School and is well-known for her sealskin creations.

The full list of appointments is here.

While it’s no longer done in Ontario or Manitoba, some provinces across the country still confer Queen’s counsel appointments on members of the bar. Most of them are made at the end of December, so here’s a roundup of the latest annoucements as well as those made earlier this year.

New Brunswick appointed 11 new QCs in 2011. Photo: Government of New Brunswick

There are 104 new Queens counsel in Alberta, which goes through the process every two years.
“This designation recognizes the excellent skill and expertise exhibited by lawyers in Alberta,” said Minister of Justice and Attorney General Verlyn Olson making the announcement on Dec. 30. “It is also a mark of the outstanding contributions they have made to the profession and in their communities.” The extensive list of honourees from both the public and private sector can be found here.

In Nova Scotia, Minister of Justice and Attorney General Ross Landry says the 12 Queen’s counsel appointees in that province have earned the respect of their colleagues and many others by making strong personal contributions to their communities and the legal profession. The recommendations for the appointments are made to cabinet by an independent advisory committee. See the full list of Nova Scotia’s QCs named Dec. 22 here.

In British Columbia, 28 lawyers received the Queen’s counsel honour on Dec. 22 from Attorney General Shirley Bond. The QC designation is an honour conferred on members of the legal profession “to recognize exceptional merit and contribution.” The list of all 28 B.C. appointees is here.

In Saskatchewan, the QC honours have been expanded to include solicitors and corporate counsel “who have contributed to the legal profession in the courtroom,” as well as the traditional barrister recipients, said Justice Minister and Attorney General Don Morgan. “These exceptional recipients being honoured with a Queen’s Counsel designation have a range of experience and represent the very best of our legal community.” The 16 honourees in Saskatchewan can be found here.

Also on Dec. 22, Pamela J. Williams was given the QC honour in Prince Edward Island by Janice Sherry, minister of Environment, Labour and Justice and Attorney General. “Pamela Williams has distinguished herself through her professional work, her leadership within the legal community, and her community involvement,” said Sherry.

New Brunswick named its QCs back in October. The 11 N.B. lawyers named are here.

“It is a prestigious honour and I congratulate the 11 individuals on their appointments. They represent the professionalism and dedication that are the qualities of Queen’s counsel,” Felix Collins, Newfoundland and Labrador’s minister of Justice and Attorney General said when making his announcement in June. The senior barristers who’ve been honoured are here.

This past year, it was the human stories of lawyers, members of the bench, and wannabe lawyers in Ontario that caught the attention of Law Times readers. Here are the top 10 most read articles from lawtimesnews.com in 2011:


1. Lawsuit alleges abusive culture at T.O. firm

2. Associate sues Mathews Dinsdale for $1.3M

3. Lawyers, judges battle at LSUC

4. Law graduate loses human rights case against articling principal

5. Ex-teacher who slept with student now seeks bar entry

6. Ex-Crown loses $1M suit over promised judicial appointment

7. Largest law firms in Canada

8. JP accused of sexually harassing six court clerks

9. Former escort turns life around to become lawyer

10. Colleague gives missing lawyer benefit of doubt

Here are the top 10 most read stories of 2011 from canadianlawyermag.com. Some are reproduced from the magazine, such as our Top 25 Most Influential — always a big draw — and some you'll only find online. As usual, the stories that rise to the top of the charts tend to be the rankings and surveys. Everyone wants to know how they measure up and where they fit in! So of course, I encourage readers to participate in all our upcoming surveys and rankings in 2012.

1. The Top 25 Most Influential (2011 edition)

2. Law school star fights LSUC’s good character ruling

3. The 2011 Canadian Lawyer compensation survey

4. The going rate: Canadian Lawyer’s 2011 legal fees survey

5. Behind the scenes: The January 2011 Canadian Lawyer cover story that interviewed defence counsel in the Russell Williams case.

6. A cut above: Canadian Lawyer highlights the best boutiques in the areas of personal injury and trusts and estates.

7. 10 things you really need to know to practise law
 
8. Useful Google tips and tricks for lawyers

9. Prairie gold: Canadian Lawyer's top 10 prairie law firms are keeping very busy

10. Osgoode student who overcame many obstacles dies

In its first year, Legal Feeds has brought legal news from across Canada to our readers. Seems lawyers like to read about what's going on with their collegues, from appointments to the bench to lawyers in trouble and more, here are the 10 most read stories of 2011 from the blog.

1. Tale of dead dog’s ashes not enough to save lawyer
 
2. Toronto criminal lawyer Marshall Sack dies

3. Top 10 tips for the well-dressed (male) lawyer

4. Judge lays into insurance lawyer
 
5. Six new judicial appointments
 
6. B.C. judge calls Justice lawyer’s conduct ‘reprehensible’
 
7. Feds announce seven judicial appointments

8. Young Women in Law hosts charity gala

9. Tax Court nixes lawyer’s attempt to write off internet poker losses

10. Crush of Chinese homebuyers create legal issues in B.C.

Lawyers and judges in the Pictou Justice Centre are seeing things in a whole new light. Nova Scotia’s newly renovated courthouse, about a two-hour drive from Halifax, features three painted glass windows from the town’s original court.

The windows were originally imported from England in the mid-1800s, but were badly damaged in a fire at the original Pictou County Courthouse a few years later. Thanks to the efforts of community members — including two lawyers, a court administrator, and a retired provincial court judge — they now once again look down over the dispensation of justice in Pictou.

“The detail in the windows has been described as the finest of its kind in Canada and it was important to preserve their history and beauty,” said retired provincial court judge Clyde MacDonald. MacDonald was one of the founding members of the Pictou Justice Complex Painted Windows Society.

The light from the restored windows — including one of the Roman Goddess of Justice — will shine over a modern courthouse that cost the provincial government $2 million to renovate and upgrade. Now all justice services in the area are contained under one roof, which features a secure interview room in cells, videoconferencing services, a room for vulnerable witnesses, a suite of secure rooms for legal counsel, and surveillance cameras and equipment with continuous views of inside and outside the courthouse. Not to mention a very special painted lady.

This is the third in our occasional photographic series of the courthouses of Canada. If you have a photo and story of the courthouse in your city or town that you’d like to share, e-mail it to editor This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Earlier this week, the Law Society of British Columbia posted a news release that it had learned of a B.C. law firm that had again fallen victim to the “bad cheque” scam.

The scheme was similar to one described in 2010, notes the LSBC.

“The ‘client’ requested help in collecting money owed by her former spouse pursuant to a collaborative law settlement. She provided a copy of a collaborative law agreement and eventually agreed to a 25 per cent contingency fee. Even before the firm sent a demand, a bank draft in favour of the firm was received from the ex-husband. Assuming the draft was legitimate, the firm wired the funds (less its fee) to a payee identified by the ‘client,’ only to discover later that the draft was counterfeit. The names used by the ‘client’ and ‘former spouse’ were Tammi Mazur and Brian Denman.

“We have also learned of an intellectual property twist that has just surfaced in relation to the phony debt collection scam. In this scam, a purported Dan Nagasakii of CCP Group International asks for help enforcing intellectual property rights in relation to the unauthorized distribution of language software by someone ‘in your locale,’” said the web site.

On the heels of that latest bit of bad news, the LSBC announced its benchers have approved a plan to offer insurance coverage as of Jan. 1 for these cheque scams that are popping up across the province.

The law society says coverage by the Lawyers Insurance Fund, specifically tailored for this risk, “will provide some protection against shortages of client funds as a result of a fake or forged certified cheque, bank draft, money order, or solicitor’s trust cheque, provided the client ID and verification rules are met.”

“Although B.C. lawyers were not clamouring for coverage, a loss to a firm, especially a small one, could be significant. As a result, the benchers took a proactive approach to insurance and decided that some insurance be provided for client trust fund losses,” Su Forbes, the LSBC’s director of insurance, tells Legal Feeds. “Coverage is contingent upon the lawyer meeting the client identification and verification rules, and will not extend to the firm’s own losses by way of overdraft to its bank.

Forbes says the insurer doesn’t know what claims might arise, “but to date there have been very few incidents of B.C. firms being caught in the scam. With shortfall losses partly covered by insurance, the financial consequences of the scam will be directly influenced by the level of due diligence exercised by lawyers.”

The LSBC maintains that awareness and vigilance are lawyers’ most important tools in combatting fraud but benchers realized there are times when practitioners get unwittingly embroiled in these scams and that some insurance coverage is “appropriate.”

“Lawyers can directly influence the cost of the insurance in future through their vigilance and care,” says Forbes. “There is no increase to the insurance fee for 2012 to cover off the risk.”

Wording of the new policies will be posted soon to the LSBC’s web site and a full description of the coverage will be in the Spring 2012 Insurance Issues: Program Report.

Details on cheque and other frauds are also available at the LSBC’s web site.

Photo: Denise Kappa/Dreamstime.com

Today is the one year anniversary of the launch of Legal Feeds. In our first 12 months, we have had more than 145,000 unique page views of just under 700 postings of news, events, and trends affecting the legal profession in Canada.

We’d like to thank all of our readers for dropping by, leaving comments, and sending along story ideas and encourage you to continue leaving comments or contact us directly at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it with your thoughts and story ideas.

Happy holidays and we look forward to serving up lots more legal news in the coming year.

Torys LLP non-executive chairman Robert Prichard will become the next chairman of the board of BMO Financial Group.

Prichard has been an independent director of BMO since 2000 and upon shareholder approval at BMO’s annual meeting in Halifax on March 20, 2012, the company intends to appoint him to the chairman’s position to replace the retiring David A. Galloway.

“I am grateful for the board’s confidence and look forward to working with the board and management to deliver superior performance by the bank that defines great customer experience,” said Prichard in a news release.

“Under Rob’s leadership, I have every confidence that good governance will remain a source of competitive advantage for BMO,” said Galloway.

No stranger to the boardrooms of large organizations, Prichard is the head of the Greater Toronto Area transport agency Metrolinx as well as a director of George Weston Ltd. and Onex Corp. Between 1990 and 2000, he was president of the University of Toronto, where he helped boost the university’s endowment to a then-Canadian record of $1.4 billion. He is also the former president and CEO of Torstar Corp.

Bruce McCuaig, president and CEO of Metrolinx, told the Toronto Star Prichard will stay on with the the agency that operates GO Transit for the Ontario government.

Ontario has appointed five new judges to the provincial court bench. Their appointments are effective Dec. 8.

Philip Anthony Downes joined the Crown Law Office — Criminal at the Ministry of the Attorney General in 1998 when he was called to the bar. As Crown counsel, he conducted criminal appeals as well as criminal trials in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice and the Ontario Court of Justice. In 2006, he moved to private practice and in 2008, he became a sole practitioner focused in the area of criminal and quasi-criminal law, as well as regulatory and professional discipline matters. Downes will preside in Toronto.

Jamaican-born Aston Joseph Hall was a criminal lawyer in sole practice from when he was called to the Ontario bar in 1995 to 2002, when he became a senior partner at Hall & Vaughan in 2002 and then opened his own law firm, Aston J. Hall and Associate, in 2009. Hall has been a director of the Criminal Lawyers’ Association. He will also sit in Toronto.

Jacqueline Loignon was called to the bar in 1994. Between 1995 and 1999, she was worked for the Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton and then went on to practise at Lang Michener LLP as an associate, where she was a member of both the Supreme Court of Canada and the Litigation practice groups. From 2001 to 2006, she was counsel for the Ottawa Police Service, and she joined the Ministry of the Attorney General as an assistant Crown in 2006. Loignon has been assigned to Ottawa.

Joseph Gilbert Raoul Maille was called to the bar in 1984 and joined the firm Ramsay Ramsay Kemp and Andrew, later known as Kemp Maille. He has also acted as standing agent for the Attorney General of Canada in of Temiskaming and served as a Deputy Judge of the Small Claims Court from 1997 until he left private practice. Maille joined MAG as an assistant Crown in 2008, working in Thunder Bay and then Haileybury. Chief Justice Annemarie E. Bonkalo has assigned Justice Maille to preside in a bilingual position in Haileybury.

Called to the bar in 1994, Heather Adair McArthur’s practice focused on criminal trials and appeals. In 2008, she opened McArthur Barristers. She has appeared at all levels of court including the Supreme Court of Canada and served as a Toronto director for the Criminal Lawyers’ Association and as a board member for the Association in Defence of the Wrongfully Convicted. McArthur will preside in Toronto.