Friends, family and colleagues of the late Edward Greenspan paid tribute to the prominent criminal lawyer on Sunday during a funeral service at the Beth Torah Congregation.
Greenspan passed away on Christmas Eve in Phoenix, Arizona at the age of 70.
“He was more than a great lawyer,” Allen Linden, one of Greenspan’s former professors, said Sunday.
“You couldn’t get a more courageous, more imaginative lawyer, but he was a great person. He loved his clients, he loved the community. He was very generous, philanthropic.”
Former president of the Canadian Bar Association Thomas G. Heintzman described Greenspan as a “force for good.”
“He cared about people and he fought for the little people,” Heintzman said.
“He had a heart of gold and when he went into a court room, he gave the best that he could give.”
Greenspan, whose legal career spanned more than 40 years, acted as the defence in many high-profile trials including criminal cases against Conrad Black, Robert Latimer and Garth Drabinsky.
Ontario’s Chief Justice George Strathy remembered Greenspan as an “extraordinary role model” to generations of lawyers across the country.
“I’ve known him as a lawyer, an advocate, a champion of civil rights,” Strathy said.
“He has made a very important contribution to the justice system in Canada and he will be greatly missed.”
Greenspan was laid to rest at Mount Pleasant Cemetery.
