BA, LLB

Judith Miriam Bell graduated from the Law School at Dalhousie University. From 1966 to 1986 she practised law and lectured at the University of Ottawa. In 1986, Judy Bell was appointed to the Supreme Court of Ontario, the third woman to receive that honour since the bench was established in 1875. She served until 1999. Judy Bell was held in the highest esteem by the legal community she served for 35 years, not only for her compassion and thoroughness, but also for her courage. It was Judy Bell who made the precedent-setting ruling in 1993 that a common-law wife was entitled to half her husband’s government pension.