The two murder trials held in Toronto in the spring of 1962 only nineteen days apart made Canadian social and legal history. The accused man in each trial, one a pimp who stabbed to death a fellow pimp, the other a thief who killed a policeman in a shootout, were the last two men to be hanged in Canada. In personal terms, for a Toronto criminal lawyer named Ross Mackay, the trials represented just two more episodes in a tumultuous life story. Mackay was the counsel for the accused in both trials, a mere thirty years old when he lost two clients to the gallows. But the trials were far from the last times that Mackay defended accused murderers in the most horrendous circumstances. It’s the story of Mackay’s dedication to the maxim that every man is entitled to a defence that Jack Batten tells in this book, a story that emerges in all its colour, drama and tragedy, a story of Mackay’s courage and the harsh penalties he paid for the often daring and controversial choices he made in life and in the courtroom.

Jack Batten graduated from the University of Toronto Law School, class of 1957, but chose to make his living as a freelance writer. As well as countless articles for such magazines as Maclean’s, Rolling Stone and Toronto Life, he has written more than forty books. Seven are crime novels, and the rest cover a range of nonfiction. These include several biographies. His book The Man Who Ran Faster Than Everyone, about the long distance runner Tom Longboat won the $10,000 Norma Fleck Award. Many of the other biographies portray lawyers and judges in professional action in and out of courtrooms in every region of Canada. Jack Batten lives in Toronto with his wife, the writer and garden designer Marjorie Harris.

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Lawyer-author Jack Batten immediately captures the reader’s attention in identifying the demons facing Ross Mackay, a superb and committed counsel dedicated to justice, but plagued. — “HON. John C. Major QC CC, Retired Justice of The Supreme Court of Canada

???An excellent and easy read for anyone interested in Canadian legal history. Ross Mackay was an exceptional criminal lawyer who has the dubious distinction of representing the last two persons

to be executed in Canada for murder. — “John Rosen, Criminal Lawyer,

Rosen & Company, Barristers, Toronto

“?A compelling and insightful chronicle of a brilliant, eclectic, and charismatic maverick. With his impeccable eye for detail, Jack Batten

has also captured the temper of the times. — “Brian Greenspan, Criminal Lawyer, Greenspan Humphrey Weinstein, Toronto