Nicholas Devlin

Nicholas Devlin (born September 30, 1971) is a Canadian jurist and former federal prosecutor. He is currently a Justice of the Court of King's Bench of Alberta.

Devlin served as law clerk for Justice Jack Major of the Supreme Court of Canada and then worked in various roles as a federal prosecutor with Public Prosecution Service of Canada. He was elevated to a federally appointed judge in 2019.

Early life and education

Nicholas Edward Devlin was born on September 30, 1971, in Calgary, Alberta.

He attended the University of Calgary where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in Canadian Studies in 1993 and his Bachelor of Law, graduating as his class's gold medalist in 1996. He went on to complete his Master of Law in 1998 at the University of Toronto where he wrote his thesis on the Charter of Freedom and Rights and freedom of the press.

Career

Public Prosecution Service of Canada

After university, Devlin clerked for Justice Jack Major of the Supreme Court of Canada and was called to the Ontario bar in 1999. There he argued prominent cases like R v. Topp, Mills v. R, R v. Taylor, Marakah v. R and Jones v. R, the last two of which formed significant dual cases regarding privacy law surrounding text messages in Canada. Devlin's role in those two cases was to represent the Crown's position during the appeal, emphasizing the loss of control over messages once they are sent, which impacts the expectation of privacy.

He was part of the landmark case R v. Antic which reaffirmed the “ladder principle” in bail decisions and emphasized the presumption of innocence and the right to reasonable bail under part (e) of Section 11 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, although Devlin's role representing the intervener was to argue for less lenient forms of detention provisions.

Outside the supreme court and in a trial fervently covered by the national media, Devlin was the prosecutor in a case in front of the Ontario Court of Appeal involving the 2011 Canadian federal election voter suppression scandal and the bail application of Michael Sona in front of Justice Harry LaForme.

He was also the prosecutor on prominent appeals like the one front of the Nunavut Court of Appeal involving Catholic priest Eric Dejaeger in a sexual abuse case and the life sentence conviction of Momin Khawaja.

Devlin served as adjunct professor at Osgoode Hall Law School from 2013 to 2017 where he taught trial advocacy techniques and cross examination methods.

Devlin was the judge that overlooked the defamation suit initiated by Quebec-based DJ SNAILS in March 2024, where he awarded the plaintiff $1.5 million in damages.

As part of his role in the Supreme Court of the Northwest Territories, Devlin ordered the release of $120,000 in frozen funds to the former CEO of Łutsël K'é Dene First Nation’s business arm Denesoline Corporation, Ron Barlas, as funds for legal defence in January 2025.

Publications