Osgoode’s Criminal Law and Procedure LLM helped Pamela Santora see the bigger picture

Pamela Santora never needed any convincing about the value of an LLM.

Before she finally enrolled in OsgoodePD’s Professional LLM in Criminal Law and Procedure in 2020, the only barriers standing in her way were practical ones: less than a decade out from her call to the bar and absorbed in her work as a prosecutor in the provincial Crown’s child abuse and exploitation team, she found it difficult to justify prioritizing her own education and skills development.

“I was on the fence for years, always too busy, too expensive or too hard,” Santora explains.

“Eventually I realized there will never be a perfect time, but it’s important to seek out challenges and improve your skills through purposeful action,” she adds.

Looking back, Santora is glad she made the leap, since it turned out to be one of the best professional decisions she has ever made.

“So often in practice we get tangled in the unique aspects of our cases, but here was an opportunity to look at the big picture, and why it is that we do things the way we do,” Santora says. “Education is what you make of it and Osgoode provides all the tools and resources necessary to create a personal experience tailored to your own goals.” 

After earning an undergraduate degree in criminology, Santora entered law school at the University of Windsor with a good idea of which direction she saw her legal career heading and set about honing her criminal law and procedure skills.

The effort paid off as Santora was awarded the law faculty’s Criminal Justice Award, which is named in memory of Brian E. McIntyre, Q.C., a former local prosecutor.

During her law school studies, Santora also served as editor-in-chief of the Windsor Review of Legal and Social Studies, a student-run journal promoting the use of the law as a vehicle for social change.

Following in McIntyre’s footsteps, Santora articled with the Crown Law Office, before accepting a permanent role as an assistant Crown Attorney in 2014. As she built up her prosecutorial experience, Santora says she always had her eye on an LLM as a way to focus on practical concepts that were relevant to her practice.

“Beyond that, I wanted the opportunity to think about these things in a more theoretical way than I was able to when faced with individual cases. The Criminal Law and Procedure LLM allowed me to branch out from a base of common knowledge into areas that I wouldn’t normally get to study,” she says.

According to Santora, the intimate, seminar-style format of Osgoode’s classes made for a particularly collegial atmosphere with her classmates, who included criminal defence counsel and other lawyers in private practice.

“It was great to see some of the same faces across different courses and get to know new people. There was lots of variety with people from other specializations taking electives and new students starting each semester,” she says. “It really felt like I got to know the other students and instructors and hear their points of view. Having students from all across the country really added to the co-operative learning environment.”

Santora, who recently took on a new role at the Crown Attorney’s office, leading its Toronto Region Internet Child Exploitation team, says she would not hesitate to recommend the Criminal Law and Procedure LLM to young practitioners in the next generation of criminal lawyers, pointing to the flexibility of Osgoode’s program, which allows students to fit in evening classes around their full-time jobs.

“Don’t wait. There will never be a perfect time, or a big empty hole in your work schedule. It can be done around your practice. You just have to look ahead and be reasonable about what you’re expecting of yourself,” she says.

To get the most out of the program, Santora suggests prospective candidates think carefully about their goals.

“It’s not about getting A+ on an assignment when you’re taking this program as a practitioner, it’s about engaging and learning all you can, and that is something that you can manage while also working during the week and sleeping at night,” she says. “It should be something you enjoy, so that you look forward to doing your readings and writing the papers. The variety of courses and electives means that you will definitely be able to find something that interests you so that the program becomes the ‘after-work’ activity you look forward to, instead of a continuation of your work day.”