Browser not supportedThe Honourable Mary T. Moreau was born in Edmonton, Alberta. Prior to entering law school, she studied at the Faculté Saint-Jean at the University of Alberta. She completed her Bachelor of Laws from the University of Alberta in 1979 while taking part in the common law/civil law exchange program at the Université de Sherbrooke in 1977. In 2019, she was granted an honourary Doctorate from the University of Alberta and, earlier this year, she was granted a Lifetime Achievement Award from Women in Law Leadership.
Chief Justice Moreau was called to the Alberta Bar in 1980. As a lawyer, she practised primarily in criminal law, constitutional law, and civil litigation. She litigated numerous landmark cases involving minority language rights and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. She is a co-founder of the Association des juristes d’expression française de l’Alberta.
She was appointed a judge of the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta in 1994. She was also appointed a deputy judge of the Supreme Court of Yukon in 1996, and of the Supreme Court of the Northwest Territories in 2005. In 2017, she was appointed Chief Justice of the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta.
Throughout her judicial career, Chief Justice Moreau has been actively involved in judicial education, administration, and ethics.
She regularly lectures at judicial education conferences and programs, and served as co-chair of the National Judicial Institute’s annual spring National Criminal Law Conference for six years. She also actively participates in international judicial education and support projects. She was a member of the National Advisory Committee on Judicial Ethics from 2014 to 2017. She was president of the Canadian Superior Courts Judges Association from 2011 to 2012.
She currently chairs the Judicial Advisory Committee for Military Judge Appointments and also chairs the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs’ Judicial Advisory Committee on International Engagement.
Chief Justice Moreau has been a member of the Canadian Judicial Council since 2017. She has served on the Council’s Executive Committee since 2021 and the Judicial Conduct Committee since 2020. She chairs the Technology Subcommittee since 2022. Additionally, she is a member of the Action Committee on Modernizing Court Operations, co-chaired by the Minister of Justice and the Chief Justice of Canada.