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demic successes. In between their graduate studies, the two travelled
around England and Continental Europe, and even made a short trip to
Morocco. Another trip to the Champagne region in France, where free samples
were poured generously, provided the foundation for Susan’s lifelong
love of champagne. Susan is firmly of the view that life’s successes are
meant to be celebrated, and no accomplishment is too small to toast with
champagne. Susan completed her graduate studies by winning the Derby-
Bryce Prize, tied for top LL.M. student among over 700 candidates from all
colleges of the University of London, and was also awarded the top prize in
international law. Not to be outdone, Marianne has in the meantime gone
on to become an internationally renowned cancer scientist, discovering a
new class of drugs and founding a now-public company to bring her discovery
to the clinic and hope to patients. Susan, it turns out, is the underachiever
in the family.
Following her time overseas, and with her newly minted credentials and
accolades in hand, Susan returned to Vancouver and rejoined the Roberts
litigation boutique. There she practised for several more years and had the
great experience of working with Gil McKinnon, Q.C., as co-counsel to
Judge Prowse in a judicial inquiry into a prison escape. This work involved
eye-opening tours of correctional institutes and investigation of correctional
policies. Yet in 1998, Susan was persuaded by her good friend and former
U of T law classmate Clayton Caverly to join him as a partner at Fraser
Milner Casgrain LLP (now Dentons). At FMC, Susan enjoyed working with
lawyers from all practice areas (and was saddled with yours truly as a very
green articled student) and was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 2005. Her
variety of work as a general civil litigator included class actions, contract
disputes, securities issues, construction defects and the general assortment
of files that is the livelihood of any general litigator, all of which prepared
her well for her time on the bench. In addition to a very busy practice,
Susan co-chaired the firm’s national litigation group, served as an elected
member of the office’s management committee and could always be
counted on to lighten up many a stressful file or meeting with a corny joke
or well-timed pun: the arsenal is deep in this regard.
Susan was appointed to the bench in 2008, which proved to be a relief for
many opposing counsel given her reputation, described by one of her judicial
colleagues, as excellent counsel with a formidable intellect who was
much better to have on the same side of a case than the opposite. There is
clear consensus among members of the bar—a rare thing indeed—that
Susan achieved the success she has based on merit and hard work. Her
work ethic carried through to the courts, where she wrote over 288 decisions
in her decade on the trial court, all while also co-authoring with Mas-