Bryan Birtles He/Him/His

Prior to joining the legal profession, Bryan worked as a journalist in Edmonton and Northern Ireland, with a focus on music, art and culture. In law school, he sat on the editorial board of the Journal of Law and Social Policy, and delivered a paper at the 2019 Socio-Legal Studies Association Conference held at the University of Leeds. Following law school, Bryan has continued to publish in legal journals on topics as varied as criminal law, Aboriginal law, and trial advocacy. He is also the author of A Treatise on Treaties: Crown-Indigenous Treaties in Canadian Law, published by Irwin Law and the University of Toronto Press.

Bryan articled as a clerk at the Superior Court of Justice in Toronto, where he worked on a number of interesting criminal and family matters, as well as a novel Aboriginal title claim to submerged land. After passing the bar, Bryan served as legal counsel to the judges of the Specific Claims Tribunal, a specialized federal administrative tribunal that determines claims by First Nations against the Crown for breaches of the Crown’s legal obligations relating to treaties, reserve lands and resources, or First Nations’ trust funds.

In his spare time Bryan likes to play pinball, watch baseball, and read the kind of detective novels you can buy at the airport.