Toronto’s 50 Most Influential: #34, Marie Henein
Our annual ranking of the people whose smarts, connections and clout are changing the city as we know it
Marie Henein
Henein Hutchison LLP
34 The former Eddie Greenspan protégée and current lawyer for Jian Ghomeshi runs the hottest criminal defence firm in Toronto. She’s smart and ruthless (awestruck admirers have compared her to Hannibal Lecter), and she looks like a lawyer in a Shonda Rimes show—complete with an asymmetrical haircut and five-inch Louboutins. In other words, she understands the importance of branding—a rare talent in a profession dominated by grey suits and bad websites. Since successfully representing ex–Ontario attorney general Michael Bryant in 2010, Henein has become the go-to lawyer for embattled doctors, lawyers and other wealthy professionals across the GTA while also continuing to take on the kind of gritty, impossible-to-win cases other litigators shrink from—and then winning them. This year, she helped overturn the manslaughter conviction of John Salmon, a Simcoe County man who fought for 45 years to clear his name in the death of his common-law wife.
Family Business:
Henein’s husband, Glen Jennings, leads the white-collar crime group at Gowlings. Her brother, Peter Henein, is a partner with a specialty in intellectual property at Cassels Brock.
