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the fifth estate
JUDGE ANDREE RUFFO

Andree Ruffo
Andee Ruffo when the fifth estate first interviewed her in 1990.
Andree Ruffo graduated at the top of her law school class and established one of the first practices to specialize in representing children. She seemed the ideal choice to be named to the Quebec youth court. When she was appointed, in 1986, Judge Andree Ruffo was one of the youngest, and one of very few female, judges at the time.

But Ruffo spoke often, and very publicly, about the flaws she saw in the youth protection services system. In her court, she refused to issue judgments that fit the resources rather than the child.

Ruffo speaking
Throughout her career, Ruffo has criticised flaws in the youth protection services system in Quebec.

Her determination to act on her conscience, and to speak her mind during her twenty years as a judge, set her on a collision course with the judiciary and with the social service bureaucracy.

Social workers and even her boss, the Chief Justice of Quebec, complained about her to the judges' disciplinary group, the Quebec Judicial Council. In total, hundreds of complaints were filed against the outspoken judge – though none of those came from children, their families, or the lawyers representing them.

Judge Ruffo
Numerous complaints against Judge Ruffo led the Judicial Council to determine, in 2004, that she was unfit to sit as a judge.

Throughout those years, the Quebec Human Rights Commission, was investigating agencies of the Youth Protection Service. In one case, they found an agency to be so seriously dysfunctional that the Commission advised the province to step in. In another they found children locked in empty cells, sometimes for days. Both agencies were in Ruffo's jurisdiction and had made complaints against Judge Ruffo.

Like Ruffo, the Commission concluded the entire youth protection system was in need of an urgent major overhaul. The province has now started committee hearings on reform.

But being right hasn't helped Judge Ruffo. In 2004, the Judicial Council determined that her behaviour and her refusal to change, rendered her unfit to sit on the bench as a judge. The Court of Appeal of Quebec dismissed Ruffo's appeal of that decision, effectively saying that a good cause does not justify improper judicial behaviour.

Ruffo today
Ruffo has asked the Supreme Court of Canada to review her case.

Now Ruffo has asked the Supreme Court of Canada to consider her case. If the highest justices in the land agree to hear her case, she may play a role in changing the law on judges' freedom of speech. If they decline, Andree Ruffo will be a judge no longer.

While she waits for their decision, Andree Ruffo keeps busy working for children. She is a founding member of the group 'Magiciens Sans Frontieres' which travels to orphanages and refugee camps performing free for children.

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