Last week’s acquittal of the five World Junior hockey players ignited a tidal wave of outrage before the judge had even finished reading the reasons. Amongst the loudest early takes was an article from the Toronto Star entitled: Why would female lawyers represent men in sexual crimes?
That oneliner sums up the Op-Ed: women in the defence bar, she claims, are strategic shields for male defendants and silent enablers of courtroom misogyny. That quib betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of what criminal defence – my work – actually is.
When I defend a person accused of sexual assault, I’m not defending sexual assault. I am defending a person’s right to a fair trial, rigorous scrutiny of the evidence, and meaningful access to competent legal representation. These rights don’t evaporate because allegations are serious or because public opinion has already rendered its verdict.
Popular commentary overlooks this reality. Every wrongful conviction that has ever been overturned began with a lawyer who was willing to stand beside an unpopular client and challenge the Crown’s case. That is not “serving misogyny”; it is serving justice. A system that abandons rigorous defence work simply because a charge is distasteful is a system that will condemn the innocent along with the guilty.
Some commentators suggest that accused men only hire women lawyers for optics and strategy. As if women lawyers are courtroom props meant to simply soften the jury. The suggestion is both condescending and unsupported. Some of the best defence lawyers I know are women. Women who have spent years in school and dedicated countless hours to the practice of law, evidence, and advocacy. To reduce their professional expertise to gender is exactly the type of thinking that kept women from the courtroom in the first place.
Vigorous defence is different from victim blaming. What really betrays women is suggesting we’re too fragile to separate professional duty from personal feeling. Demanding that female lawyers choose between their oath and their gender loyalty is a false and dangerous dichotomy.
“What about the victims?” you might ask. Cross-examination can indeed be traumatic, but courts have safeguards to soften that harm: witness screens, closed-circuit testimony, and tight limits on irrelevant or myth-based questioning. Where we still fall short is in on-the-ground supports for complainants – timely trauma counselling and stable funding for sexual-assault centres. The solution is not to blunt scrutiny of the evidence or stop defence counsel from doing their job; it is to keep refining the balance between a complainant’s dignity and an accused’s rights.
A justice system where lawyers shy away from forceful defence out of fear of public backlash does not protect women. It empowers moral panic at the expense of the rule of law.
This work matters. My job isn’t to determine guilt or innocence – that’s for judges and juries. My job is to ensure the system functions as (we hope) it should. Some of my male colleagues handle these types of cases with sensitivity and skill. Some don’t. The same is true of some female lawyers. The point is gender doesn’t determine competence, compassion, or commitment to justice.
The real question isn’t why women defend men accused of sexual offences. It’s why we still think our gender should determine our professional choices.
When the justice system works properly – with good lawyers on both sides of the courtroom, fair judges and proper procedure – everyone benefits. Guilty defendants are convicted. Innocent ones are acquitted. Evidence is thoroughly tested. Rights are respected.
That’s not serving misogyny – that’s serving justice. And justice doesn’t wear a suit or a skirt: it wears a blindfold.
