Three alumni of the University of Alberta Faculty of Law have been appointed to the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta.
The three new judicial appointees are Melanie Hayes-Richards, '98 LLB, who was elevated from the Provincial Court of Alberta; Nathan J. Whitling, QC, '97 LLB; and Shaina Leonard, '02 LLB, '14 LLM.
Hayes-Richards has served on the Provincial Court in the Criminal Division since 2018. Before joining the bench, she practised primarily in the area of criminal law, working as a Crown prosecutor and as legal counsel for the Court of Appeal of Alberta. She has taught criminal law courses to police, prosecutors and to law students, and recently served on the judges panel for the Clinton J. Ford Moot.
Whitling won the Horace Harvey Gold Medal in Law at UAlberta Law, and went on to earn a master of laws degree from Harvard Law School in 1998. In 1999-2000, he served as a law clerk to the Honourable Justice John Major of the Supreme Court of Canada. Whitling had a diverse litigation practice for the first 15 years of his career. He then moved into criminal defence with a focus on criminal appeals. He has argued cases before the appellate courts of Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Ontario, as well as before the Federal Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada. Additionally, he is a past coach of UAlberta Law's Gale Cup Moot team.
Leonard worked as a maritime surface officer with the Royal Canadian Navy, Naval Reserve, while attending law school. After graduation, she clerked with the Court of Appeal of Alberta and the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta. She joined the firm of Borden Ladner Gervais LLP in Calgary, in 2003.
In 2006, Leonard became a legal officer with the Canadian Armed Forces. In 2009, she deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan, where she worked alongside American military lawyers as a legal mentor to the Afghan National Army. In 2012, she returned to the Naval Reserve and began full-time employment with the Public Prosecution Service of Canada. In 2017, she became the deputy chief federal prosecutor for the Alberta region of the service. For the past three years, she has helped coach the Laskin Moot team at UAlberta Law.