W. Scott Childs, B.Sc., LL.B.
Mr. Childs graduated from the Faculty of Law, University of Windsor in 1995, and completed his articles at the Court of Appeal for Ontario. He has been a member of the Ontario and British Columbia Bars since 1997 and 2021, respectively. His practice spans multiple jurisdictions across Canada, with a specialty in police-related legal issues. His clients include government, police boards, chiefs of police and individual police officers.
Part of Mr. Childs present practice involves matters of complexity that benefit from retaining a lawyer from outside the province.
Mr. Childs offers a broad range of skills and experience:
i. extensive litigation and advisory expertise in all aspects of the police complaint process: he served at the Office of the Ontario Independent Police Review Director (OIPRD) as a lawyer, legal director and Deputy Police Review Director (OIPRD is the equivalent of “police complaint commissioner”); he has private-practice experience in police complaint matters; and he has conducted complaint investigations;
ii. expertise in employment-related human rights issues, including workplace discrimination and harassment prevention and response, especially in the police workplace (Mr. Childs was a coauthor of the Phase 1 and Phase 2 Final Reports Concerning Conduct Measures Under Part IV of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act (VIEW HERE), part of the RCMP’s response to the 2020 report of The Honourable Michel Bastarache, Broken Dreams, Broken Lives);
iii. police board governance, particularly involving the relationship between police boards and chiefs of police;
iv. police-related policy development and drafting;
v. labour relations, including 3 years as president/vice-president of the Ontario Crown Attorneys Association (the bargaining unit for 1,200 assistant crown attorneys), which involved collective agreement negotiations, grievance arbitrations and related matters; and
vi. criminal law prosecutions in the provincial and superior courts, including 13 years as an assistant crown attorney with the Scarborough Crown Attorney’s office and the provincial Guns & Gangs Initiative, and as Crown counsel with the Department of Justice (Canada);
Mr. Childs has co-authored the last five editions of the Ontario Police Services Act, Fully Annotated (VIEW HERE), and continues as a coauthor of the upcoming Ontario Police Statutes, Fully Annotated, which annotates the new Community Safety and Policing Act, 2019 and the Special Investigations Unit Act, 2019). He has also lectured extensively on criminal law issues and the full range of police-related legal issues. Previously, Mr. Childs served as a police officer with the Toronto Police Service and the Ontario Provincial Police.