Natalie Mullins

About Natalie Mullins

Natalie Mullins is a Toronto partner at Gowling WLG whose practice centres on complex disputes over contaminated land. The Law Society of Ontario has certified Mullins as a specialist in two fields, Civil Litigation and Environmental Law. Clients include major oil companies, banks, municipalities and real estate developers, among others.

Called to the Ontario bar in 2002, Mullins appears often in Ontario's courts at every level, the Court of Appeal included. The courtroom isn't the only venue, either. There have been several trials and arbitrations, plus hearings before administrative tribunals, among them appeals at the Ontario Land Tribunal of clean up orders issued by government.

These files rarely stay simple. One matter can involve many parties and properties, civil and regulatory proceedings running side by side, and legal questions that haven't been settled before. The science often matters as much as the law, and bankruptcy and insolvency issues frequently come into play. Mullins navigates complex scientific evidence, examines and cross-examines scientific witnesses at hearings, and works with a wide circle of hydrogeologists, toxicologists, engineers and appraisers.

Best Lawyers named Mullins its Environmental Law "Lawyer of the Year" for 2022, and Who's Who Legal and the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory have recognized the work as well. Mullins chaired the Environmental Law Section of the Ontario Bar Association in 2018 to 2019, teaches trial advocacy, and has been a guest instructor at Osgoode's Intensive Trial Advocacy Workshop, which draws lawyers from across Canada. In a 2018 Law Times story, Mullins, as co-counsel, pointed to a key question in an Ontario case: how far a party that isn't at fault must answer for historic off-site contamination it didn't cause or permit.