Mercedes and lawyer Marshall Swadron successfully argued that costs should be awarded in an unsuccessful public interest constitutional challenge. Costs in the amount of $100,000 were awarded to the Empowerment Council in its Charter challenge to the Box B and community treatment order provisions in Ontario’s Mental Health Act. This was a notable accomplishment given […]

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Mercedes successfully represented the three children of an elderly Orthodox Jewish woman in a coma at the Baycrest Hospital in a challenge to her power of attorney for personal care document.  The woman had appointed her three children as her attorneys for personal care.  The power of attorney document was boilerplate and contained an “end […]

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Mercedes spoke to protestors outside Toronto Police Headquarters who were demanding a full public inquiry into the deaths of mentally ill persons involved in interactions with police.  The protest followed the shooting death by police of Michael Eligon who had left a psychiatric facility and was found in downtown Toronto wearing a hospital gown and […]

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Mercedes was quoted by The Toronto Star in an article examining the Ontario Court of Appeal’s decision in Gligorevic v. McMaster.   In this appeal, Mercedes (along with lawyer Karen Steward) successfully argued that the appellant had received ineffective assistance from his lawyer in a Consent and Capacity Board treatment incapacity matter.  Read The Toronto Star […]

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Following her appointment by the Ontario Court of Appeal as amicus curiae (along with lawyer Karen Steward) in a treatment incapacity appeal, Mercedes successfully argued that the appellant had received ineffective assistance of counsel from his Consent and Capacity Board lawyer.  This was the first time that an ineffective assistance of counsel claim was advanced […]

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