The man they courted to be in the mayor’s corner
Alan Lenczner is the go-to lawyer when ‘your goose is just about cooked’
When Mayor Rob Ford was on the hunt for an expert litigator to help fight the conflict-of-interest charge that has — at least for now — unseated him, big brother Doug, ever the take-charge older sib- ling, polled the Ford family legal pals. Who, he asked, is the best in the game? The name that came up, again and again, was Alan J. Lenczner, a 69-yearold veteran of high-stakes court battles with a reputation as one of Canada’s toughest and most skilful civil litigators.
Lenczner is not the kind of lawyer your average city councillor could afford to hire. His big-name clients have included Conrad Black and turfed Hydro One executive Eleanor Clitheroe.
He’s also represented one of the two warring McCain brothers in a headline-grabbing family feud over frozen french fries.
“He is the lawyer you go to when your goose is just about cooked,” said former Supreme Court of Canada justice Ian Binnie, a longtime colleague, during a friendly roast of Lenczner five years ago.
Like any experienced litigator with a strong reputation, Lenczner gets asked to take on some of the day’s toughest cases.
Enter Rob Ford. Lenczner had never met the mayor, but agreed to represent Ford after a call from Doug Ford earlier this year.
In an explosive decision Monday, Justice Charles Hackland ruled that Ford breached Ontario’s conflict-of-interest law when he voted in February to excuse himself from paying back $3,150 to lobbyists whose donations to his football foundation he improperly accepted.
Hackland carefully picked apart Lenczner’s defence and ordered Ford removed from office, but put the ruling on hold for two weeks. Ford and Lenczner plan to appeal.
On Wednesday, Lenczner will face a three-judge panel in Divisional Court to request a stay of Hackland’s ruling that would keep Ford in office until the appeal is heard, in January.
If the panel does not accept his argument for the stay, all hell breaks loose on Dec. 10: Ford loses his job, the city loses its mayor and Toronto is thrown into a state of unprecedented uncertainty.
ALAN LENCZNER WAS
born in Mumbai, India, to Romanian parents in February 1943. His father, a medical doctor with the British Army during the Second World War, moved the family to Canada when Lenczner was 10 and took a job at Toronto General Hospital.
Lenczner studied law at the University of Toronto and launched his career in 1969 at what is now McCarthy Tétrault LLP. He took on some of the biggest commercial litigation cases of the 1980s and ’90s, the best-known being the Lac-Corona case, which he argued with colleague Ronald Slaght.
Together, Lenczner and Slaght proved International Corona Resources was the rightful owner of a claim in Hemlo, Ont. — one of the most valuable gold properties in North America. The case yielded what was then the largest litigation jackpot in Canadian history.
In 1992, he and Slaght left McCarthys to launch one of the first boutique litigation firms in the city. Two decades later, they have grown from two lawyers to 50.
In some ways, the man in the mayor’s corner is a little like Ford himself: friends and colleagues describe Lenczner as an outsized personality, colourful, larger than life, a real character. He once called Jean Chrétien a “meddlesome interferer,” back when he was helping Conrad Black sue the prime minister for advising the Queen not to award a British peerage to a Canadian commoner. The man’s got chutzpah. He has been dubbed the Cassius Clay of the courts. A fellow litigator once compared his style to “a bulldog who’s just found a freshly cooked steak.” But those who know him well also say he is kind, informal, unpretentious and highly respected by friends and foes. In court, he is known for being a “happy warrior” who enjoys the battle and argues with a smile on his face. Lenczner has a reputation for being quick and to the point, to the relief of many a judge. He laid out Ford’s defence in less than an hour and a half, ending the hearing a full day earlier than expected. Mentored by legendary litigators John Robinette and Doug Laidlaw, Lenczner adopted the gunslinger style of the latter. Colleagues say he is strategic, analytical, whip-smart and takes studied risks that usually pay off. “Alan is unusual,” says Ronald Slaght, a longtime friend and partner. “He’s a formidable package.”
ON A WEEKDAY
afternoon two days after the Ford verdict, Lenczn- er sits at a large wooden table in a small meeting room in his law firm’s 26th-floor downtown office. Stacks upon stacks of documents are spread across the table; Lenczner is preparing for a case. A slight man with soft brown eyes and thinning grey hair, Lenczner wears a slim-cut navy suit and a pair of rainbow-striped socks. Over sandwiches from Soup Nutsy, which he ordered in, and cookies pilfered from a tray in the firm’s kitchen, he shares a few stories. Among the most legendary Lenczner tales from outside the courtroom is the one about how he proposed to his wife, Joan, the night they met in 1969. “What happened was I went to a cocktail party of a good friend of mine,” he says, grinning, as he leans back in his chair. “And there was this, um . . .” He hesitates. “You’ve heard of the miniskirt, right?” “So it was this crappy little apartment because we were all just young people,” he says. “It was crowded. I could see that there was this woman with a miniskirt on and I saw a guy kind of coming from the other end of the room and I thought, jeez, he’s heading straight for her. So I went and I put my arms around her and I said, ‘We’re going to dinner darling.’” They were wed seven months later and have been together ever since. They have three grown children, three school-aged grandchildren, a house in Moore Park and a 140-acre farm north of Toronto. Lenczner says they have planted 10,000 trees on the property since they bought it four decades ago. One of his favourite things to do is drive his old tractor around while pondering cases. Top defence comes at a cost for those who hire lawyers of Lenczner’s calibre, who typically bill $900$1,000 an hour. He won’t name his price, but says it is less than $900 and depends on the client.
At a time in his career when most people would be winding down — and a time when he himself purports to be retired — Lenczner is juggling two high-profile cases.
There’s Ford. And there’s the Amazon villagers going up against Chevron in what is said to be the largest lawsuit against a major company anywhere in the world. The case is an attempt to force Chevron, through its Canadian subsidiaries in Ontario, to pay a $19-billion Ecuadorian court judgment. It’s his biggest since Lac-Corona.
Asked about his favourite cases, Lenczner smiles at the memory of Murray Pezim — the big-time mining promoter at Corona who discovered Hemlo.
“He was larger than life,” Lenczner says. “He was a real character. Lots of people said he was a scoundrel. But . . . it was a colourful case. Some of the cases are very interesting for legal issues and some of the cases are very interesting because of the people you meet.”
Would the Ford file fall into the latter category?
“He is a character,” Lenczner says. But on that case, still before the courts, the lawyer is quiet. Lenczner will say that Ford in their meetings has been “very sincere, very polite . . . very straightforward, down to earth. There’s no guile about him.”
Having been through many a loss at this stage in his career, Lenczner appears unfazed by Monday’s ruling, and is focused on the next step.
In court Wednesday, Lenczner will argue that to eject the mayor from office before he can appeal would deny the democratic will of the Torontonians who elected him and cause the mayor “irreparable harm” that can’t be compensated with money.
The documents have been filed. His arguments are prepared. Lenczner is ready, once again, to go to court.