Criminal and Regulatory
When your freedom is on the line, you need the best possible defence. Our lawyers are widely regarded as the top criminal practitioners in the country.
We act for clients facing investigation and advocate with law enforcement bodies to prevent charges from ever being laid. We have obtained acquittals for clients in numerous jury and judge-alone trials, and secured new trials and acquittals in numerous appeals. We defend the full range of criminal and quasi-criminal cases across a range of criminal and provincial statutes. We have also acted as special prosecutors in select cases, which gives us unique insight into how law enforcement bodies and prosecutorial services work.
We have special expertise in white-collar and financial crime cases (e.g., those investigated by RCMP-IMET and OSC-JSOT, and cases prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office), drawing on our firm’s multi-disciplinary practice in areas like securities regulation and commercial litigation.
We have earned the respect of judges and prosecutors alike not just through our courtroom work, but also as authors of leading textbooks on search and seizure, digital evidence, and sentencing. We also regularly teach defence lawyers, Crowns, and judges across the country as part of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada’s National Criminal Law Program.
Practice Areas
Competition Act
Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act
Criminal appeals
Criminal Code
Homicides
Money laundering
Income Tax Act
Provincial Offences Act
Securities Act
Sexual offences
White Collar Crime
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Representative Work
Defending one of the principals of Fortress Real Developments Inc. in a Criminal Code fraud prosecution related to syndicated mortgages.
Regularly advising telecommunications companies and financial institutions in response to Criminal Code production orders and other lawful access requests/demands.
Acted for government agencies and Crown corporations investigated for and/or charged with criminal and regulatory offences.
Acted successfully for the appellant in R. v. I.M., 2025 SCC 23, a precedent-setting case on youth sentencing.
Defended and obtained an acquittal for an e-commerce CEO in a judge-alone sexual assault trial in the Ontario Court of Justice.
Defended and obtained an acquittal for Umar Zameer on a charge of first-degree murder in a much-publicized jury trial in the Superior Court of Justice.
Represented Jacob Hoggard (former lead singer of the Hedley band) in a sexual assault appeal before the Ontario Court of Appeal, in which the Court held that expert evidence on the neurobiology of trauma is inadmissible.
Defended and obtained acquittals for the former Chair of CannTrust in a securities fraud and insider trading prosecution under the Securities Act before the Ontario Court of Justice.
Defended and obtained an acquittal for former Liberal MP Raj Grewal on breach of trust charges under the Criminal Code in a political corruption case that proceeded in the Superior Court of Justice.
Defended and obtained a stay for a large construction company in a workplace fatality prosecution under the Occupational Health and Safety Act before the Ontario Court of Justice.
Represented an airline executive in a money laundering investigation by the OPP, which investigation was terminated without charges.
Represented the appellant in R. v. Sharma, 2022 SCC 39, a landmark case dealing with Indigenous rights and sentencing.
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Recognition
Chambers Canada, Crime, Band 1 (Nader Hasan, Gerald Chan)
Chambers Canada, White-Collar Crime and Government Investigations, Senior Statespeople (Brian Gover)
Chambers Canada, White-Collar Crime and Government Investigations, Band 2 (Gerald Chan)
Chambers Canada, White-Collar Crime and Government Investigations, Band 4 (Nader Hasan)
Lexpert, White-Collar Defence & Investigations, “Most Frequently Recommended” (Brian Gover, Gerald Chan)
Lexpert, White-Collar Defence & Investigations, “Consistently Recommended” (Nader Hasan)
Lexpert, White-Collar Defence & Investigations, “Repeatedly Recommended” (Stephen Aylward)
Legal 500, White-Collar Crime, Hall of Fame (Gerald Chan)
Best Lawyers, Criminal Defence (Gerald Chan, Nader Hasan, Edward (Ted) Marrocco)
Benchmark Litigation, Criminal (Brian Gover, Gerald Chan)
Benchmark Litigation, White Collar Crime (Gerald Chan, Nader Hasan, Andrea Gonsalves)
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