Canadian Lawyer

26 A P R I L 2 0 1 9 w w w . c a n a d i a n l a w y e r m a g . c o m F or a lawyer who started his career on a typical path, Ryan Teschner has surely benefited from and embraced tumultuous events. As a young associate with a promising career on the partnership path at Heenan Blaikie, his career seemed straightforward. But it was not to be, once the firm dissolved in dramatic fashion. "I probably never would have left Heenan Blaikie if its doors hadn't been closed. That was just kind of the more conservative career person that I was. But because of what happened, none of which was in my control, it opened up a world of oppor- tunity that I'm so grateful that I've had." Teschner is now executive director of the Toronto Police Services Board, but he has had several high-profile roles, touching on some of the most hot-button issues in policing and civilian oversight. While still at Heenan Blaikie, Teschner was lead counsel to the "Indepen- dent Civilian Review Concerning Matters Relating to the G20 Summit." After the chaotic G20 summit, where police were widely criticized for their conduct, the Toronto Police Services Board asked the former Ontario associate chief justice, John Morden, to conduct a review. Morden was at Heenan Blaikie at Ryan Teschner's experience with chaotic events will serve him well leading the Toronto Police Services Board By Tim Wilbur OPPORTUNITY IN UNCERTAINTY C R O S S E X A M I N E D the time, and he chose a young Teschner as his lead counsel. Teschner says Morden had been a key men- tor for him at the firm even before they worked on the G20 report. Morden "would have me into his office and talk to me about his career, but [he] also asked me for help. He would ask me to look at arbitration cases that he was arbi- trating and early drafts of decisions and early chapters of his book on civil procedure." While the chaos of the G20 summit pre- sented a key career-building opportunity for Teschner, the uncertainty was much closer to home when Heenan Blaikie closed its doors. Teschner remembers being at the firm on its last night of existence with his colleague and men- tor, Sandra Barton. "We just kind of looked out at the lights out- side of an empty boardroom, with boxes in the hall and paper everywhere, having a hard time coming to grips with what was happening." While Teschner followed Barton to Gowl- ings in 2014, the G20 report was becoming increasingly influential in policing and gover- nance circles. Teschner would be regularly asked to speak about the report and its findings, and that is where he met Waterloo's then-chief of police, Matt Torigian. When Torigian left his role in Waterloo and became the deputy minister of community safety for the Ontario government, he asked

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