FORMER CROWN REMEMBERED AS ‘CONSUMMATE PROFESSIONAL’
Former Kingston, Ont., Crown attorney Jack McKenna has died at the age of 72 after an extended illness.
McKenna, who was in charge of the Kingston Crown office from 1989 until his retirement in 2000, grew up in Kingston and worked for the city’s police department while taking summer courses at Queen’s University before attending law school, according to the Kingston Whig-Standard.
Superior Court Justice Helen MacLeod-Beliveau remembered McKenna as a “consummate professional” at his funeral on July 11.
“He was very calm in his demeanour no matter how tough the cases got or how unreasonable the other counsel was being,” the Whig-Standard reported her as saying.
CPD CREDITS FOR MENTORSHIP
The Ontario Bar Association’s mentorship program is offering continuing professional development credits for participants in the upcoming year.
The program, which is now accepting applications for 2011-12, links young lawyers with experienced ones to provide those new to the profession with guidance and practice tips to help them launch a successful career in law and become engaged in their local legal community.
Participants can each count up to six hours of meetings and conversations towards the Law Society of Upper Canada’s 12-hour requirement for continuing professional development.
The program will run out of eight regions this year: Ottawa, the Greater Toronto Area, Kingston, Windsor, Guelph, Thunder Bay, Sault Ste. Marie, and Sudbury, Ont. Applications will be accepted until Aug. 31 and can be made online by visiting oba.org/mentorship.
LAWYER HEADING TO OZ
Stikeman Elliott LLP global mining group partner Quentin Markin is leaving Toronto to join the firm’s office in Sydney, Australia.
The move is effective in October. It comes after a previous secondment to Stikeman Elliott’s office in London, England, from 2005-06.
Markin has a practice that emphasizes corporate finance and mergers and acquisitions for public companies. His work involves a focus on interjurisdictional transactions in the mining sector.
FMC PONIES UP FOR UBC
Fraser Milner Casgrain LLP has donated $250,000 towards the University of British Columbia’s faculty of law building project, a move that leaves the university just $200,000 short of its $24-million fundraising target.
The new $56-million facility is scheduled for completion in August in time for the beginning of the 2011-12 academic year.
“FMC is pleased to support UBC law in the completion of this ambitious and forward-thinking project,” said John Sandrelli, FMC’s managing partner in Vancouver.
“At FMC, we believe the professional and business community has a key role to play in supporting our educational institutions and helping them develop the leaders of tomorrow. We hope our support will help UBC law continue to offer law students first-class legal education for many years to come.”
IP LAWYER JOINS MILLER THOMSON
Craig Armstrong has joined Miller Thomson LLP as a partner in the intellectual property group in Waterloo, Ont.
Armstrong, who focuses on developing and implementing patent and trademark protection strategies, had spent more than 25 years in private practice in the Waterloo area since his call to the bar in 1982.
He serves both local and national clients and prosecutes patent and trademark applications in Canada, the United States, Europe, and elsewhere.
STOCKWELL DAY JOINS MCMILLAN
McMillan LLP has landed former Conservative cabinet minister Stockwell Day as a senior strategic adviser to assist the firm with expansion in the Asia-Pacific region and South America.
Day started work for the firm on July 1 out of the Vancouver office. He’ll also be supporting McMillan’s Hong Kong mission.
“McMillan is quickly becoming Canada’s legal and professional Pacific gateway, able to lend insight, infrastructure, and expertise to help Canadian business extend and advance their Asia-Pacific interests,” said McMillan CEO Andrew Kent. “Mr. Day adds additional depth and capacity to that already robust professional platform.”
Day has also served as an MLA in Alberta and was a senior cabinet minister at both the provincial and federal levels during a 25-year career in public service.
“I feel very fortunate to be welcomed to the McMillan team as its expertise, presence, and commitment to the Pacific Rim markets continue to attract and assist Canadian businesses,” Day said.
CLIMATE CHANGE BOOK HONOURED
The Law of Climate Change in Canada has received the Walter Owen Book Prize for legal research.
The book, which was edited by Torys LLP’s Dennis Mahony and published by Canada Law Book in 2010, was the first of its kind to tackle the large and growing multidisciplinary area of climate change law.
Besides Mahony’s work, the book also involved contributions from Torys’ David Dell, Tyson Dyck, Patricia Koval, John Laskin, Michael Pickersgill, Alex Smith, John Terry, and John Tobin.
The Walter Owen prize is a national award presented each year by the Foundation for Legal Research to recognize outstanding new contributions to legal literature that enhance the quality of legal research in Canada.
