Ontario has appointed four new judges to the Ontario Court of Justice and a Barrie criminal defence lawyer is on the list.
Angela McLeod was called to the bar in 2002 and has worked as a sole practitioner for her entire career, as defence counsel, as a federal prosecutor and a victim's advocate.
The appointment is a dream come true for McLeod who will preside in her home town.
"Born and raised in Barrie. Born at RVH," said McLeod with pride. "That's the candles on the icing on the cake. That I'm able to serve the community that I started serving when I was 16. I was a Big Sister of the Big Sister's Association and have volunteered as a member of the board of directors for New Path Youth and Family Services, Elizabeth Fry, a variety of charities here and it makes it particularly special to continue here in that way."
At the age of 30, McLeod attended university on an entrance scholarship where she met a young woman whose goal was to be the first female Portuguese judge.
That opened her eyes to the dream and it became McLeod's goal also.
"My family is a working class background. I'm the first person in my family to go to university and it's not that I never thought about going to law school. It just wasn't in my realm. When I met her and she shared that with me and she came from a working class background it just became a possibility," said McLeod. "I knew then I wanted to be on the bench."
In her articling interview McLeod told her 'principal' that she wanted to be become a judge. That person is now Justice Michael Code who just finished the murder trial of Dellen Millard and Mark Smich who were convicted of the first-degree-murder of Laura Babcock.
McLeod's other articling principals are all esteemed legal figures -the now Hon. Justice Melvyn Green and high profile lawyers Frank Addario and Phil Campbell.
The long process to apply for the bench began last Spring for McLeod who was eventually chosen out of 300 applicants for each position.
She received a call from Attorney General Yasir Naqvi Friday morning officially confirming her appointment.
"I'm still trying to make my brain come round. It was very surreal. I was immediately calm and very humbled. It's the reason I went to law school," she said.
Justice McLeod has been a volunteer director with the New Path Youth and Family Services, Elizabeth Fry Society, Criminal Lawyers' Association of Ontario and Simcoe County Lawyers' Association.
In her second year of studies at Osgoode Hall Law School, she was accepted into the Criminal Law Intensive Program.
One of her professors in that program, criminal defence lawyer Paul Burstein, was also on the list of appointed judges with McLeod, making it a 'full circle moment' for her.
It was only on Nov. 3 that she was appointed as federal prosecutor for Muskoka, which was a big change and now this call to the bench.
She says her role changes from an advocate to clients to an adjudicator who will now serve everyone.
"The role of judges is to serve the community at large not just the clients," she said. "I am serving the community that is my community."
The appointment is effective Dec. 28.
