Disciplinary hearing set for ex-U of M law dean

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This article was published 19/08/2023 (801 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A dean of law’s unexplained exit from the University of Manitoba has remained a mystery for more than three years — but an investigation into accusations Jonathan Black-Branch embezzled university funds will be exposed at an upcoming hearing.

The Law Society of Manitoba has scheduled five dates — Sept. 18-22 — for disciplinary proceedings related to Black-Branch’s alleged “breach of integrity” when he was employed at U of M.

“In the current matter, the disclosure is very large, with over 1,000 pages of documents,” said Leah Kosokowsky, chief executive officer of the professional regulatory college.

While the society aims to begin a hearing within one year of authorizing charges against a lawyer, an extension was required in this case because of its complexity and all the paperwork involved, Kosokowsky said in an email.

The public hearing is expected to be in-person and involve witness testimony.

The U of M appointed Black-Branch, a lawyer with expertise in international law and nuclear treaties, to oversee Robson Hall ahead of the 2016-17 school year. As a result of his deanship, he automatically became a bencher, a governing board member at the law society.

In the spring of 2020, Black-Branch went on a sudden leave from U of M. It became permanent.

U of M administration has remained tight-lipped, citing privacy concerns. Multiple sources told the Free Press that faculty members were given limited information and warned not to speak to reporters about the personnel change after it happened.

The university’s annual whistle-blower report, published shortly after Black-Branch’s five-year term was cut short, raised more questions.

The document described a single tip about an unnamed senior employee’s alleged financial misconduct, and a followup investigation that found wrongdoing — “with respect to the purchase of goods and services, conflict of interest, and mismanagement and misuse of funds” — had occurred. “There were also findings that the employee directed other persons to commit wrongdoing,” states an excerpt from the 2019-20 report.

Its release prompted a group of U of M-affiliated lawyers to send a confidential letter to the law society to report their all-but-certain belief that Black-Branch, who was licensed to practise law in the province at the time, was the anonymous staff member.

The regulatory body charged the former dean in 2021 after staffers were contacted by U of M in regards to concerns that arose from an audit of his use of university funds. Earlier that year, he was unlisted as a practising professional for hire on Manitoba’s lawyer registry because he was deemed “inactive,” meaning he had stopped paying fees and is not insured to work locally.

As of 2023, Black-Branch is also no longer in the Barristers’ Register — a United Kingdom listing of anyone who has been called to the bar in England and Wales and is authorized to practise. When he was a dean, he had at least two residences, in Winnipeg and London.

“He wound up stealing over a million dollars from the University of Manitoba and the faculty of law, and that’s shocking news that should be out there,” said law professor Jennifer Schulz, speaking about concerns her employer may have signed a non-disclosure agreement with her former boss at a legislative committee meeting in the fall.

All speakers received parliamentary privilege at the Nov. 2 session on the Non-Disclosure Agreements Act, a private member’s bill that sought to restrict NDAs in cases of discrimination or harassment but ultimately, did not become law.

During her presentation in support of the bill, Schulz said U of M was not transparent about the money that went missing under Black-Branch or whether he received a severance package.

“The university, at the same time, was conducting a massive fundraising campaign so they were asking all of us as taxpayers to donate to a university that didn’t police its own and didn’t ask for compensation from a law dean for the money that he had taken,” she said.

Schulz noted Black-Branch obtained an Ivy League education while he was dean. He drew on law school coffers to pay for first-class flights, hotels and other expenses that were inappropriate and unrelated to his duties, she said.

A public resumé indicates he participated in leadership programs at Harvard University and Yale University in 2018 and 2019, respectively, and obtained an executive master of business administration from Brown University in 2020.

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The University of Southampton announced Black-Branch was taking the reins of its law school in August 2020, although the U.K. post-secondary institute went back on the appointment within a week of issuing a press release that sparked Winnipeg reporters to inquire about it.

Black-Branch has not provided any interviews on the case. His lawyer, Greg Bartel, did not respond to requests for comment.

A U of M spokesperson said administration respects the law society’s regulatory process and will participate in the hearings “as required.”

The university has issued guidelines for reporting fraud and mandated online training on the subject since its 2020 whistleblower investigation concluded a leader misused money and there were “internal control weaknesses” related to the oversight of employee expenses and reporting.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Maggie Macintosh
Education reporter

Maggie Macintosh reports on education for the Free Press. Originally from Hamilton, Ont., she first reported for the Free Press in 2017. Read more about Maggie.

Funding for the Free Press education reporter comes from the Government of Canada through the Local Journalism Initiative.

Every piece of reporting Maggie produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.