PRINCE ALBERT — Lori O'Connor and Buffy Rodgers have been appointed as judges to Prince Albert Provincial Court in Prince Albert.
Judge O'Connor received her Bachelor of Laws from Dalhousie University in 2008 and was called to the bar in 2009. She completed her articles with Legal Aid in Thompson, Man., where she continued as a staff lawyer until 2010. In 2010, O'Connor joined Saskatchewan Public Prosecutions as a Crown Prosecutor. She became a Regional Crown Prosecutor in Melfort in 2019.
O'Connor has extensive experience in criminal law gained from her career as a Crown prosecutor. She has taken an active role in mentoring law students through Dalhousie Law School's Weldon Mentor Matching Program, and has provided court and testimony training to nurse examiners, victims services volunteers and peace officers. She also regularly contributes book reviews to the Canadian Law Library Review that appear on CanLii.
Outside of her professional life, O'Connor bakes banana bread for the Melfort Food Bank and enjoys walking her dog.
Judge Rodgers received her Bachelor of Laws from the University of Saskatchewan College of Law in 1998 and was called to the bar in 1999. She completed her articles with Wardell Worme & Missens in 1999, and remained there as a junior lawyer until 2001.
Rodgers held a variety of roles from 2001 to 2006, including acting as legal counsel at Legal Aid Saskatchewan and partner at Wardell Driedger Cotton & Rodgers, later Wardell Gillis Tangjerd Rodgers & Cotton. She joined the Saskatchewan Ministry of Justice and Attorney General as Crown counsel in 2006 and became a Senior Crown Prosecutor with Saskatchewan Public Prosecutions in 2007. She has held the position of senior Crown prosecutor - OH&S since 2015.
Over her legal career, Judge Rodgers has developed expertise in a wide variety of legal areas including criminal defence, child protection, civil law, small claims and legal aid. As a Crown prosecutor, she has spent a significant portion of her career in docket and trial court, and in the Court of King's Bench practising both criminal and regulatory law, with a speciality in OH&S files.
Judge Rodgers is a past secretary of the Saskatchewan Crown Attorneys Association and is a recipient of the Premier's Award for Excellence in the Public Service for her work on the Serious Violent Offender
