Board of Directors

CHRISTA CrOOS

Christa is a lawyer at Woodward and Company Lawyers LLP, providing legal services to Indigenous governments. She was involved in climate organizing as a university student, organizing with other students for UofT’s divestment from fossil fuels and later attending COP22 in Marrakech with the Canadian Youth Climate Coalition. After completing a law degree at the University of Ottawa and specializing in Environmental Law, she articled at the Environmental Law Centre at the University of Victoria. Before that, she studied chemistry, environmental science, and public policy and remains committed to using all the tools at her disposal to further climate action and climate justice for those impacted first and worst. She tries to remember that while organizing can lead to the big wins that we need, small wins like growing more of her own food from her two small garden beds, are important too.

ALADDIN DIAKUN

Aladdin practices corporate & business law in association with WRD LLP in Toronto, where he serves startups, SMEs and nonprofits looking to create positive impacts amid a dynamic risk landscape. Aladdin also provides advisory services to polycrisis-focused leaders & teams as a Certified Executive Coach. He has nearly 20 years of experience in climate & sustainability across NGOs, academia, and the private sector.

Aladdin holds the FSA Credential from the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board and the Sustainability & Climate Risk Certificate from the Global Association of Risk Professionals.

Aladdin received his J.D. from the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law and articled at the Toronto office of a large national business law firm. He also holds a M.A. in Global Governance from the Balsillie School of International Affairs, where he focused on the nexus of global security and environmental change and conducted SSHRC-funded research into the governance of geoengineering technologies. He was also a Junior Fellow at Waterloo's Centre for International Governance Innovation. Aladdin holds a Specialized Honours B.A. from York University's Glendon College, where he was the top graduating student in Political Science.

Aladdin is the Chair of the Board of Impact Zero, a Toronto-based circular economy not-for-profit. He is also a long-running contributor to the Suntory Foundation's Reexamining Japan in Global Context Project, which convenes Japanese and international experts & policymakers to share learnings on converging challenges like demographic aging, post-disaster recovery, and the global pandemic response. Having witnessed and experienced burnout at various points in his career, Aladdin is passionate about health and wellness as key dimensions of systemic change. Aladdin is available for media interviews and speaking engagements.

Meredith James

Meredith is a lawyer providing legal services to Indigenous and environmental non-profit organizations and an LLM student at the University of Victoria. She previously practiced Aboriginal, environmental, and municipal law in Victoria and Toronto. She has a long-standing commitment to finding climate solutions. As one of the founding members of the Canadian Youth Climate Coalition in 2006, she was an active local organizer in Edmonton and attended the UNFCCC meetings in Bonn. She has served on the board of local and national NGOs including Sierra Club Canada, EcoSchools Canada, Cycle Toronto, and Bike Victoria. She was recently appointed to the Township of Esquimalt’s Environmental Advisory Committee. Her latest mission is to eat as many blueberries as possible while they are in season.

SYDNEY LANG

Sydney is an associate at Cavalluzzo LLP in Toronto and practices primarily in the areas of labour law, Aboriginal law, and Indigenous rights. She works with unions, associations, First Nations, and individual workers on various health matters, including exposure to toxic substances and climate-related health and safety issues such as extreme heat and poor air quality. Sydney is interested in the impact of climate change on work and the role that workers and trade unions can play in facilitating a just transition.

Sydney has participated in various climate-related projects and campaigns related to fossil fuel divestment, mining resistance, and Indigenous sovereignty. She currently organizes for climate justice and corporate accountability with the Mining Injustice Solidarity Network and is a member of the Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers’ Climate and Labour Committee.

LARISSA PARKER

Larissa was called to the bar in Ontario in November 2022 and is currently clerking. She completed her BCL/JD at the McGill Faculty of Law and articled in environmental and municipal law at Gowling WLG in the Toronto Environmental Group. Her career and academic focuses are in environmental assessment law, climate litigation, and environmental Charter applications. Before law, Larissa was actively involved in advocacy efforts against climate change in roles with the Youth Climate Lab, Climate Justice Montreal, and university-based activism groups. Larissa also completed a Master’s in climate change adaptation at Oxford, where her dissertation focused on the socio-cultural effects of climate change in Indigenous communities and related resilience-building.

Larissa is passionate about supporting grassroots climate change movements and spending as much time outdoors as possible. She loves to run, camp, canoe, hike, and swim whenever she can.

RICHELLE MARTIN

Richelle is a lawyer based in Fredericton, New Brunswick, and maintains a practice at Juniper Law with particular interest in environmental law and Aboriginal rights. Richelle received her law degree from the University of Ottawa in May 2021 where she participated in the EcoJustice Environmental Law Clinic and completed a Pro Bono Students Canada placement with the Native Women’s Association of Canada.

In addition to serving on the L4CJ Board, Richelle is a member of the Law Society of New Brunswick's Climate Change Task Force and is an instructor in St. Thomas University's Environment and Society Program.

Outside of work, she enjoys exploring the outdoors by foot, ski, and canoe with her family.

LAURA MACINTYRE

Laura is a young lawyer based in Toronto, with a deep passion for and commitment to climate justice. As a law student at the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, Laura became very interested in inter-generational climate justice, and co-published an article that assessed the merits of youth climate litigants’ claims under section 15 of the Canadian Charters of Rights of Freedoms. After completing her articles in Toronto, she returned to complete a Masters of Laws at Harvard Law School, where she studied the relationship between climate justice and reproductive justice and autonomy. Today, Laura remains actively engaged in several research projects related to climate change and its’ intersection with various other axes of inequality, including racism and settler colonialism. Besides her passion for climate justice, she is an avid musician, yogi, reader, and skier.

christie mcleod

Christie is an associate at Miller Thomson LLP and a graduate of the JD/Masters in Environmental Studies program at Osgoode Hall Law School and York University, where her Master’s research focused on deriving and implementing a fair or proportional emissions reduction target in Canada. 

Christie has worked with Human Rights Watch's Environmental and Human Rights Division in New York City and Toronto and with West Coast Environmental Law. Christie is the founder of Human Rights Hub Winnipeg, and is a volunteer researcher for the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Global Steering Committee. In 2019, Christie drafted an open letter to Justin Trudeau and Minister Wilkinson calling for Canada to adopt and legislate stronger emissions reduction targets, which was signed by nearly 500 law students and law faculty members from across Canada. Christie has also written several op-eds on human rights issues which have been featured in Maclean’s, the National Observer, and the Winnipeg Free Press.

JENNIFER WONG

Jennifer is an associate at Richards Buell Sutton LLP in Vancouver, BC where she practices in real estate law, regularly advising on affordable housing projects. She is a graduate of the Indigenous Lands and Government Intensive at Osgoode Hall Law School, and previously worked at West Coast Environmental Law (“WCEL”). Jennifer’s work at WCEL focused on aiding a First Nation translate its traditional laws into a resource management policy for its Lands and Resources department, assisting the First Nation to implement its laws throughout its territory. In her spare time, she enjoys playing softball and coddling her two cats.