A look at some key cases involving Sheilah Martin
OTTAWA — Sheilah Martin of Calgary has been appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada. Here’s a look at some of the cases she has worked on since she was called to the bar in Alberta in 1989: • Thomas Sophonow Inquiry — After working as a professor and dean of the University of Calgary’s law school, Martin practised criminal and constitutional law. In 2000, she testified as an expert witness in the Thomas Sophonow inquiry about the amount of compensation he should get for his wrongful murder conviction. Sophonow was tried three times and spent nearly four years in prison for the 1981 killing of 16-year-old Barbara Stoppel in Winnipeg. The Manitoba government awarded him $2.6 million. • Pro bono work — Martin acted pro bono for the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund and the Alberta Association of Sexual Assault Centres in cases before the Supreme Court. In 2002, she represented LEAF as an intervener in the case of Ivon Shearing, the leader of a religious sect in B.C. He had been found guilty of sexually abusing several teenage girls. The high court upheld most of the convictions, but granted a retrial in the case of one girl. • Dustin Paxton trial — In 2012, seven years after she was appointed to the Court of Queen’s Bench of Alberta, Martin convicted Dustin Paxton of torturing and starving his roommate before dropping him off near death at a hospital. She also declared Paxton a dangerous offender. “I simply cannot find on the evidence before me that there is a reasonable expectation, based on more than a hope, that the public will be protected by a longterm supervision order or by anything less than an indeterminate sentence,” she wrote in her decision. • Physician-assisted suicide — In 2016, Martin granted what is believed to be the first court approval for a physician-assisted suicide in Canada. The federal government was still working on its new law when Martin ruled the woman had met the criteria set out by the Supreme Court and there was no need to prolong her suffering. The woman, known as Ms. S., was in the final stages of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. • Ordered new trial — That same year, Martin reviewed the acquittal of a 16-year-old boy accused of raping a 13-year-old girl in a park. At trial, provincial court Judge Pat McIlhargey questioned why the girl “did not scream, she did not run for help” or confide in a friend. Martin ordered a new trial, saying McIlhargey had allowed “unexplained myths and stereotypes to enter his assessment of the complainants’ credibility.” • Cindy Gladue — Martin, appointed to the Alberta Court of Appeal in June of 2016, was on the panel that unanimously ordered a new trial in the case of Bradley Barton, an Ontario truck driver acquitted of first-degree murder in the death of Cindy Gladue. The Indigenous sex-trade worker was found dead in an Edmonton motel room. She bled to death after a night of what Barton called consensual, rough sex. The Appeal Court ruled in 2017 that the trial judge made serious errors, including how he charged the jury about the law of sexual assault relating to consent. “Despite our society’s recognition of individual autonomy and equality, there still remains an undeniable need for judges to ensure that the criminal law is not tainted by pernicious and unfair assumptions,” the decision said.