The Law Society of Upper Canada (LSUC) hosted The Six-Minute Employment Lawyer.

Chairs of the event were Malcolm J. MacKillop of Shields O’Donnell MacKillop LLP and Christine M. Thomlinson of Rubin Thomlinson LLP.

Speakers included:

The Honourable Madam Justice Susan G. Himel of the Superior Court of Justice

Sharan K. Basran, Legal Counsel, Manager of Legal Services, Human Rights Legal Support Centre

Scott D. Bergman, Cooper and Sandler LLP

Lauren M. Bernardi, Bernardi Human Resource Law

Matthew L.O. Certosimo, Borden Ladner Gervais LLP

Richard J. Charney, C.S., Ogilvy Renault LLP

Mary Beth Currie, Bennett Jones LLP

Michael P. Fitzgibbon, Watershed LLP

Jeffrey Goodman, Heenan Blaikie LLP

M. Norman Grosman, Grosman, Grosman & Gale LLP

Michael F. Horvat, Ogilvy Renault LLP

Malcolm J. MacKillop of Shields O’Donnell MacKillop LLP

Dan Michaluk, Hicks Morley

Natasha A. V. Miklaucic, Borden Ladner Gervais LLP

N. Nicole Nussbaum

Jim Patterson, Bennett Jones LLP

Michael E. Royce, Lenczner Slaght Royce Smith Griffin LLP

Janice Rubin, Rubin Thomlinson LLP

Stuart E. Rudner, Miller Thomson LLP

Jason Squire, Lerners LLP

Christine M. Thomlinson, Rubin Thomlinson LLP

Elizabeth Traynor, Siskinds LLP

Michael D. Wright, Cavalluzzo Hayes Shilton McIntyre & Cornish LLP

John Yach, Shields / Hunt

Andrea York, Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP

Loreta Zubas, LLM, C.S., Zubas + Associates

What does this song have to do with waiver of tort? See Slaw to find out.

University of Toronto Faculty of Law and the Law Foundation of Ontario presented the third biennial symposium – Combating Hatred in the Twenty-first Century: Legal Remedies.
The Use of the Criminal Code to Combat Hate
Introductions & Overview
• Mark Sandler, Lawyer – Cooper & Sandler LLP, Barristers and Solicitors
Panel Discussion
• Acting Inspector Steve Irwin, Toronto Police Service
• Deputy Director Howard Leibovich, Crown Law Office – Criminal
Use of Civil Remedies to Combat Hate
Introductions & Overview
• Marvin Kurz, Lawyer – Dale Streiman & Kurz LLP
Debate: Section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act
• Professor Richard Moon, Faculty of Law – University of Windsor
• Mark Freiman, Lawyer – Lerners LLP
A Menu of Innovative Remedies
• David Matas, Lawyer
• Professor Patrick Monahan, Vice President Academic & Provost –
York University
• Douglas Elliott, Lawyer – Roy Elliott O’Connor LLP

1:30 pm Fighting Hatred in Europe: A View from the Front Lines
(Colony Ballroom)
• Right Honourable Denis MacShane, MP – British Parliament
Concurrent Workshops
1. Hate on the Internet (Terrace Suite)
• Saleha Khan, Instructor – Ontario Police College
• Marvin Kurz, Lawyer – Dale Streiman & Kurz LLP
• Dr. Abbee Corb, Open Source Intelligence Specialist – Hate Crime Extremism Investigative Team

Campus Issues
• Professor Lorne Sossin, Faculty of Law – University of Toronto
• Julia Hanigsberg, General Counsel – Ryerson University
• Nouman Ashraf, Former Director of the University of Toronto’s
Anti-Racism and Cultural Diversity Office
• Bram Freedman, Vice President, External Relations and
Secretary General – Concordia University
3. What do Human Rights Laws have to do with Hate?
• Raja Khouri, Commissioner – Ontario Human Rights Commission
• Raj Anand, Lawyer – WeirFoulds and Chair, Ontario Human Rights
Legal Support Centre
• Nathalie Des Rosiers, General Counsel – Canadian Civil Liberties
Association
4. Sentencing for Hate Motivated Crime
• Mark Sandler, Lawyer – Cooper & Sandler LLP, Barristers and Solicitors
• Sandra Bacchus, Deputy Crown Attorney – Attorney General
• Julia Sandler, Assistant Crown Attorney – Attorney General

4:00 pm Voices of Experience
Moderator
• Justice Harry LaForme, Ontario Court of Appeal
Panelists
• The Honourable Irwin Cotler, M.P. for Mount Royal, Québec
• Zubeda Vahed, Senior Policy Advisor – Ministry of Education
• Reverend Dr. Brent Hawkes, Senior Pastor – Metropolitan Community Church of Toronto
• The Honourable Zanana Akande, M.Ed., B.A

Liberal Party leader and Leader of the Official Opposition, Michael Ignatieff, spoke at the 2009 UWO Law Alumni Dinner.

This year marked the law school’s 50th anniversary.

The Western Law Alumni of Distinction Award was presented to Doug Ferguson, Director of the Clinical Legal Services (CLS) at Western and outgoing President of the Liberal Party.

The event was sponsored by Lerners LLP.

Omar Ha-Redeye, Doug Ferguson, and Lawrence Gridin at the 2009 UWO Law Alumni Dinner.

Omar Ha-Redeye participated in the finals for the Lerners LLP Cup at the University of Western Ontario.

He was awarded the Mr. Justice CD Stewart Trophy for Appellate Advocacy.  The award is given to the team with the highest score during any of the preliminary rounds.  Omar shared shared the trophy with his partner Lawrence Gridin, who also writes on Law is Cool.

The winner of the Lerners LLP Cup this year was Christopher Crighton.

Lawrence Gridin, Leitch J, Kileen J (ret), O'Reilly J, Omar Ha-Redeye

Coverage of the event can be found on the UWO Law website.  A special thanks goes to Prof. Mysty Clapton and Lerners LLP for hosting the event.

On Sept. 24, 2008, Omar Ha-Redeye participated in the Lerners LLP Cup.  The competition mimics an appellate court, where the issues of law are under dispute, rather than the facts of the case.

The competition discussed a theoretical review of the recent Supreme Court Case R. v. A.M., (2008) SCC 19, over the constitutionality of sniffer dogs in schools.  Omar had coincidentally met with Justice Binnie, who ruled with the majority in this case, and briefly spoke to him about the decision the previous week.

The University of Western Ontario describes the competition,

The Faculty runs an internal appellate advocacy competition called the Lerners LLP Cup. This voluntary competition gives upper-year students the opportunity to argue a hypothetical case before an appellate court. Judges, practicing lawyers and third-year students generously volunteer their time to act as judges for the competition. The top students advance to the final rounds to compete for the Lerners LLP Cup. Doing well in this competition is the gateway to qualifying to represent Western Law in one of several external advocacy competitions.

Omar was selected as one of 8 finalists from 66 competitors from among all upper year students at the school.  His partner in the competition, Lawrence Gridin of Law is Cool, was also selected as a finalist.

He will proceed to the final competitions next week,  which is actually judged by members of the bench from the Court of Appeal.  Although junior lawyers rarely speak at the Court of Appeal, these competitions (called moots) are a good indicator of comfort for the purpose of speaking to motions, a common task for many barristers.

Omar will also be eligible to represent UWO at one of the external moots during the January Term, 2009, which include:

Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition, sponsored by McCarthy Tétrault LLP
Laskin Memorial Moot Court Competition (Administrative and Constitutional Law)
Wilson Moot (Constitutional Law on minority Issues)
Niagara International Moot Court Competition, sponsored by Lerners LLP
Gale Cup Appellate Moot Competition (Criminal Law and Charter issues)
Canadian Corporate/Securities Law Moot Court Competition

On the first day of school, Omar Ha-Redeye welcomed incoming first-year students at the Mature Students Reception during Orientation Week.

As President of the Mature Students Club, Omar related a common law school saying,

In 1L they scare you to death,
In 2L they work you to death,
In 3L they bore you to death.

He warned the students not to let others scare them during their first year, reminding them that many brought skills and experiences that their peers lacked.

Omar also thanked Lerners LLP for hosting the reception for the students.  The reception would also not have been possible without the assistance of the Orientation Week Committee.

The Dean of UWO Law, Ian Holloway, also gave a moving welcome, both at the Mature Students Reception, and to the entire incoming class.  Dean Holloway elaborated on the importance of lawyers in democratic societies,

Many of you will be familiar with the line from Shakespeare, “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers”.  It’s generally taken as one of the early lawyer jokes – and as a sign of how long we’ve actually been unpopular, but the truth is that Shakespeare offered this as proof of the opposite. The passage, which is taken from Henry VI… is uttered by a character named “Dick the Butcher”. Dick is part of a gang led by a character named Jack Cade, whose goal is to stage a coup d’etat – to overthrow the government. The line – uttered as it was by a murderous bully – was intended by Shakespeare to highlight the precariousness of our tradition of the rule of law, and to make the point that the surest way to chaos and tyranny even then was to remove the guardians of independent thinking.