James R. Howie

About James R. Howie

Jim Howie represents people whose lives have been upended by serious injury. The litigation practice, always on the victim's side, centres on personal injury, insurance claims and medical malpractice. Howie's a partner at Howie, Sacks & Henry LLP, a firm built with fellow founding partners to serve injured people.

Called to the Ontario Bar in 1980, two years after finishing law at Queen's, Howie is certified by the Law Society of Ontario as a Specialist in Civil Litigation. Cases have taken the partner to trial and into the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, the Divisional Court and the Ontario Court of Appeal, along with tribunals such as the Financial Services Commission of Ontario. The Superior Court has also qualified Howie as an expert in personal injury law.

Teaching other lawyers is a big part of the career. Howie has often chaired and lectured at personal injury programs run by legal associations, given frequent talks on auto insurance at Osgoode Hall Law School, and written or presented for Canadian Defence Lawyers and Lexpert. The 2002 president of the Toronto Lawyers Association, Howie is a former director of The Advocates' Society and has held a seat on the Medico-Legal Society of Toronto's council since 2000.

Brain injury is a cause that reaches beyond the office, too. Jim started the yearly charity golf tournament for the St. Michael's Hospital Head Injury Clinic and has chaired it many times, and served from 1992 to 1994 as a director of the Brain Injury Association of Toronto. In 2018 the Ontario Trial Lawyers Association named Howie its Plaintiff's Lawyer of the Year.