754 THE ADVOCATE
VOL. 79 PART 5 SEPTEMBER 2021
accepted the offer and began working in the Surrey Crown office in January
1997, immediately immersing herself in the depths of criminal law and
practice.
In the late 1990s, the Surrey Crown office was, by today’s standards, a relatively
small office staffed with several veteran prosecutors and a few
newer lawyers. The small office expanded rapidly due to the increasing
population of Surrey, the closure of the Langley courthouse and the later
closure of the beloved Delta courthouse. New prosecutors were hired to
meet the increased workload and a few new junior lawyers were hired to
conduct photo radar prosecutions. As a result, there were a number of new
“under 30” prosecutors who joined the office. Satinder was one of these new
young lawyers.
The Surrey Provincial Court was, and indeed still is, the busiest Provincial
Court in the province. While that often meant that the new prosecutors
worked many long days, the work was interesting and challenging. The new
young prosecutors were in court nearly every day and gained enormous
valuable experience. The sky was the limit in terms of available work: traffic
court, youth court, bail court, adult trial work, minor to very serious matters,
sometimes all in the same week. Best of all was the camaraderie
among the younger lawyers who learned from each other and were ably
guided by the more experienced prosecutors. The Surrey judges were
mostly reasonable to appear in front of, and the Surrey defence lawyers
were mostly reasonable as well.
Satinder made her mark very early on. Since she was new to criminal law,
logically the starting point was to read the Criminal Code from cover to cover.
This is how she spent her evenings and weekends at the beginning of her
new job. Satinder was impressive counsel, on one occasion forcefully arguing
the nuances of a mischief prosecution such that the newly appointed
Provincial Court judge adjourned the matter and asked her to prepare written
submissions. Written submissions, in Provincial Court in the late 1990s,
were unheard of. Crown counsel did not even have computers.
It did not take long for the more senior lawyers in the office to notice how
hard of a worker Satinder was, her capacity for a large volume of work, her
dedication to her work and her organizational skills. As a result, there were
many requests from those lawyers to have her assigned as their junior on
very serious cases, mostly murder cases. They were wise to see that her
work would make them look good.
Satinder is mostly quiet, discreet and reserved, but it turned out she had
another side: a more fun-loving side that most frequently emerged at the
annual Crown counsel conferences. While there was much learning during