Frank Walwyn, Law’93, a partner at WeirFoulds LLP, has a burgeoning national and international reputation. Now he has added two new honours to supplement his impressive resume. This spring, the American College of Trial Lawyers (ACTL) inducted him as a Fellow. On April 20, the Ontario Bar Association (OBA) will present him with its Award for Distinguished Service.

“Both events are acutely humbling, deeply appreciated and give rise to heightened introspection,” says Walwyn. “What strikes me is that they speak to very different facets of my professional life.” Walwyn practises law not only in Ontario but also in the Caribbean, where he is a member of the bar in eight different jurisdictions. He has set high professional standards during the course of his career and has been repeatedly named as one of Canada’s top corporate and commercial litigation lawyers in Best Lawyers in Canada.

The OBA award is for Walwyn’s professional contributions and career achievements in Ontario as recognized by his peers. This includes his service as a past President of the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers, and as a member of both the Judicial Appointments Committee for the Ontario Superior Court of Justice (Greater Toronto Area) and the Ontario Provincial Court.
 
Fellowship in the ACTL, a premier professional trial organization founded in 1950, recognizes he has achieved the very highest standards of trial advocacy, ethical conduct, integrity, professionalism and collegiality. In becoming a Fellow, which is granted by invitation only, Walwyn joins a select 150 Ontario lawyers in an organization with a total current membership of over 5,700 lawyers in Canada and the U.S. In both Canada and the Caribbean he handles complex multi-jurisdictional litigation and many of his cases have resulted in precedent-setting judgments.

When speaking of his work, Walwyn focusses on the intellectual challenge of problem-solving. “What is consistent in my day-to-day work is not just helping individuals and corporations, but being able to engage in some of the most difficult, but exciting problems that arise in business, and particularly in the context of international business. It is this challenge that interests me every hour of every day, and provides the reward for what are admittedly long days with hard work.”

Reflecting on his legal education at Queen’s, Walwyn says, “It is interesting that no matter how complex the problem, or how sophisticated the financial instrument, I always rely on the basic principles I learned at Queen's Law. The concepts in Evidence, Business Associations and International Tax continue to serve me well every day in every file.”