2025 Merv Leitch QC Memorial Lecture

March 26 | Noon - 1:00 p.m. | McLennan Ross Hall (LC 231/237)

Chief Justice Michael H. Tulloch will deliver the 2025 Merv Leitch QC Memorial Lecture on March 26 to the University of Alberta Faculty of Law. The lecture will be offered both in-person and virtually.

Chief Justice Tulloch was appointed Chief Justice of Ontario and President of the Court of Appeal for Ontario on December 15, 2022. Prior to his appointment as Chief Justice, Justice Tulloch served 19 years as a judge. First, 9 years as a trial judge on the Superior Court of Justice, where he was first appointed in September 2003, and secondly, he served 10 years as an appellate judge on the Court of Appeal for Ontario, elevated in June 2012.

In 2016, Chief Justice Tulloch was appointed by the Ontario government to conduct important reviews which resulted in two extensive reports: the Report of the Independent Police Oversight Review (2017) and the Report of the Independent Street Checks Review (2018). He served on the Government Response Team for the Commission on Systemic Racism while working as a Crown Attorney. He was Chair of a review panel on Osgoode Hall Law School’s admissions policy in 2006.

Chief Justice Tulloch served as a member of the Ontario Superior Court Education Committee, the National Judicial Institute, and the Commissioner’s Judicial Advisory Committee on International Engagement. He is currently a Senior Fellow at Massey College, University of Toronto. He was a Distinguished Fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto and a Distinguished Research Fellow in the Centre of Law and Policy at Ryerson University (now Toronto Metropolitan University). He is also a Distinguished Fellow at McLaughlin College, York University. He was a founding member and a patron of the Second Chance Scholarship Foundation and Chair of the Advisory Board to the Black Business and Professional Association. He has been a frequent speaker in various post-secondary institutions as well as professional and community forums.

Chief Justice Tulloch was born in Jamaica. He holds a B.A. from York University and a LL.B. from Osgoode Hall Law School. He has also received honorary Doctor of Laws degrees from the Toronto Metropolitan University, the University of Guelph, and the Law Society of Ontario, as well as an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Tyndale University and Seminary. He was admitted to the Bar of Ontario in 1991.