In his thirties, Lee Cohen gave up a lucrative
practice to devote himself to refugee cases – including
the defense of 200 Sikhs who landed on Nova Scotia’s
shores. Working out of his Halifax home, he lives almost as
humbly as his clients. Fiercely outspoken and provocative,
he regularly locks horns with immigration officials.
As the biography explains, Cohen himself has felt like an
outsider. His parents fled persecution in Eastern Europe and
growing up in St. John, New Brunswick, he knew what it was
to be taunted as “a dirty Jew”.
The refugee cause is more than a passion for Lee Cohen -
it’s an obsession. “I take the refugee process
extremely seriously,” he says. “This is the one
legal case in Canada where if you lose, there’s a death
penalty.”
Original Air Date - January 6, 2004
Links
Human
Cargo: CBC TV's six hour dramatic series about the world of
refugees
Human
Cargo: An advocate for claimants and refugees: Lee Cohen
Lee Cohen
- Immigration Lawyer
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