Alumna Justice Karen Hewitt remembered for long, celebrated career and her work with the U of A

After a long career with many laurels, the Honourable Justice Karen Hewitt passed away at the age of 60 on Sept. 17.

A veteran of the legal field, Hewitt was a vital part of the University of Alberta Faculty of Law for many years and a much-celebrated member of the legal community.

“The Faculty of Law is honoured and proud to count Justice Hewitt among our most esteemed alumni and sessional instructors,” says Dean Barbara Billingsley of the Faculty of Law. “Throughout her career, and in a variety of significant ways, she devoted exceptional time, expertise and care to the betterment of the legal community and to our Faculty's mission of providing top quality legal education to the next generation of lawyers. Her presence will be missed, but we will continue to benefit from her inspiring legacy for years to come."

After graduating from the Faculty of Law with the Class of 1989, Hewitt was admitted by the Alberta Bar in 1990.

Just two years later, she joined the Alberta Ministry of Justice, where she would eventually hold the position of crown prosecutor for more than 25 years. Seeking new challenges, she embarked on a Master of Laws degree from Osgoode Hall at Toronto’s York University. After receiving the degree in 2011, she began publishing numerous works on criminal law for legal societies around Canada.

Hewitt began a long and fruitful relationship with the U of A in 2012 when she returned to the Faculty of Law as a sessional lecturer, where she taught courses on advanced criminal law. After three years, her teaching garnered her the prestigious Pringle/Royal Sessional Teaching Excellence Award and, later, the Faculty nominated her for the William Harvey Alexander Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching.

In 2017, Hewitt was a panelist with the Women's Law Forum's (WLF) Glass Ceilings speaker series, which tackled the topic of violence against women. The series won the Best Event of the Year Award from the U of A Students' Union in October of that year.

Throughout her career, Hewitt took on a multitude of leadership positions in the legal community.

In 2010, Hewitt received Concordia College University of Edmonton’s Distinguished Alumni Award. In recognition of her contributions to the field, she received the Queen’s Counsel designation in 2016. That same year, she received the Alberta Women in Law Leadership Award in the Leadership in the Profession (Government) category.

Hewitt received two prominent and important honours in 2018. First, her peers elected her to serve as a bencher of the Law Society of Alberta. Later, she was sworn in as a justice of the Alberta Court of Justice.