DARLENE MADOTT
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Portrait Photography
- Frank Nagy

DARLENE P. MADOTT*

Juris Doctor, 1983

*Darlene Madott Professional Corporation

2 Jane Street, Suite 506

Toronto, ON M6S 4W3

(416) 768-7820

madott@dmfamilylaw.net

After over three decades in practice and partnership at Teplitsky, Colson, LLP, Darlene Madott has recently embraced change and transitioned her practice from downtown litigator to peacemaker in Toronto’s west end, on the Bloor subway line. It has been a process of transformation in the making for over a decade.

"It takes courage to make change. Fear of change is not an option. I have never known a single client to regret the choice to leave a loveless or abusive marriage. On the other side of fear lays freedom. I am there to help provide support, understanding and knowledge with the journey. I come equipped with an enlarged toolkit."

She now offers family mediation services, alternate dispute resolution services, counsel work, and armchair advice to the self-represented, in addition to her regular family law practice.

She successfully completed The Osgoode Certificate in Elder Law, and Elder Mediation Training Program, Marathon Mediation, and Certificate in Family Law Arbitration, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, Ontario.

After her call to the Ontario Bar in 1985, Darlene Madott began her career as a litigator, and participated in precedent-setting cases, which included:

After her call to the Ontario Bar in 1985, Darlene Madott began her career as a litigator, and participated in precedent-setting cases, which included:

  • A Trinidad husband obtains a stay of Ontario proceedings based on Trinidad being the more substantial jurisdiction (Nicholas);
  • A woman obtains the right to sue grandparents for support, based on a contractual concept of the family (Cheng);
  • An international child abduction case raises constitutional and conflict-of-laws issues where immigration legislation conflicts with the Children’s Law Reform Act and the return of abducted children to the home jurisdiction (Maharaj);
  • A mobility case, where an access father successfully resists the move of his children with their mother to North Bay, (Tumino);
  • In an Application for variation of child support and financial disclosure, where the parties had a separation agreement that provided for non-variable child support, special expenses, and waiver of future financial disclosure, the father was ordered to provide financial disclosure as mandated by the Child Support Guidelines and the information was ordered sealed for 12 months. (Quinn v. Keiper).

However, as Darlene Madott developed in the practice of family law, she became increasingly disenchanted with litigation as a way to resolve most matrimonial disputes, sensitized to the lasting impacts of the way people end their relationships:

"What separating couples normally want is a resolution that is fair, respectable and sustainable. Matrimonial clients do not want to be legal precedents. They want life after loss, and in a very deep sense, want their families to survive."

A published writer, as well as a barrister, Madott’s clients receive the benefit of her written advocacy. Returning to the root of the word “advocate,” Madott derives meaning and satisfaction in her work from the concept of "giving voice" to those who cannot tell their own stories. She brings a uniquely creative and caring approach to the practice of family law.

Recent Articles

Last Word
Three Decades in Private Practice, So Far
Supreme Advocacy, November 28, 2018
Work less, think more. It is a privilege to be paid to think for a living. "Lawyers should work less and think more," was a saying of my late senior partner. Thinking and good judgement, just as character, are not qualities that necessarily come with a law degree. They are slowly built, over time, and time is something that is in ever diminishing supply. More...
Beverley McLachlin’s Full Disclosure has voice and authority
Canadian Lawyer, May 22, 2018
First times are to be treasured. That Beverley McLachlin was the first female Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada is special. That her first novel, Full Disclosure, written in the first year of retirement is not only expertly and tightly crafted, but one terrifically good read, is also special. More...

Bar Admission:

Ontario Bar 1985

Education:

Osgoode Hall Law School, LL.B (1983)
University of Toronto, St. Michael's College,
Gold medal, Hons. B.A. (1985)
Collaborative Law Training (Level 2) Certificate (2006)
Family Law Arbitration, Conrad Grebel University

Affiliations & Memberships:

Ontario Bar 1985
Law Society of Upper Canada
Toronto Lawyers Association
ADR Institute
Ontario Association of Family Mediators
Collaborative Practice Toronto
Canadian Italian Advocates Organization (C.I.A.O.)
Writer’s Union of Canada