Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond | |
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 Turpel-Lafond in 2011 | |
| Born | February 1963 (age 61) Canada |
| Other names | Mary Ellen Elizabeth Turpel-Lafond |
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Mary Ellen Elizabeth Turpel-Lafond (born February 1963) is a Canadian lawyer and law professor. She has served as a judge and as a legislative advocate for children's rights.
Turpel-Lafond has been a legal and constitutional adviser to aboriginal leaders, including to Ovide Mercredi, National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, during the negotiations over the Charlottetown Accord. She worked on land claims with the Indian Law Resource Center in Washington, DC. She has taught at Dalhousie University, the University of Toronto, and the University of Notre Dame, and has served as a judge on the Provincial Court of Saskatchewan. Time magazine named Turpel-Lafond as one of the "100 Global Leaders of Tomorrow" in 1994;[1] in 1999, Time honoured her as one of the "Top 20 Canadian Leaders for the 21st Century".[2] Turpel-Lafond also served as British Columbia's first Representative for Children and Youth. In 2018, Turpel-Lafond became a professor at the Peter A. Allard School of Law at the University of British Columbia (UBC). She was later named the inaugural director of the University of British Columbia's Indian Residential School History and Dialogue Centre.
Until 2022, Turpel-Lafond was celebrated as one of the most accomplished First Nations scholars in the history of Canada.[3] However, her statement that she is a Treaty Indian was disputed in an October 2022 CBC News report that found major discrepancies between available documents and Turpel-Lafond's own statements about her ancestry.[1] Following the CBC News report, Turpel-Lafond left the University of British Columbia; in addition, various honors and awards that she had received were revoked or relinquished, including all her 11 honorary degrees and the Order of Canada.
In 2024, the Law Society of British Columbia released a report which stated that DNA analysis indicated that Turpell-Lafond most likely had recent Indigenous ancestry, but had numerous "mischaracterizations" in her credentials. The geneticist who analysed her DNA results later said he could not link Turpel-Lafond to any specific Canadian Indigenous community.[4] The DNA data has not been made public.
- ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
leo1was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Fowlie, Jonathan (November 21, 2009). "Children's advocate pulls no punches". Vancouver Sun.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
cbc1was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Leo, Geoff (July 31, 2024). "Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond says a DNA test backs her ancestry claims. CBC asked experts to weigh in". CBC News.