U of Manitoba law profs urge police to investigate former dean after law society says he misspent over $500K

Five professors at the University of Manitoba's faculty of law are urging the school and Winnipeg police to pursue legal action against a former dean who a regulatory body found committed misconduct by misspending half a million dollars of university funds. 

The professors detailed concerns in a letter to Winnipeg police on Thursday, suggesting U of M administrators "may have documentation and/or additional information that may be relevant to a potential criminal investigation" into the actions of Jonathan Black-Branch while he was dean of the U of M's law faculty, a position he held from 2016 until his sudden departure in 2020.

"I would certainly hope that the University of Manitoba would pursue Jonathan Black-Branch to the full extent of the law, and I would encourage them to do so," said Jennifer Schulz, one of the five professors who signed the letter.

"Now we have a finding from the Law Society of Manitoba saying that his conduct 'amounted to fraud' on the criminal standard of proof. So it would seem to me to be smart to go after him," she told CBC.

In a decision dated Dec. 15, a disciplinary panel of the law society found Black-Branch "on many occasions breached his duty of integrity and has therefore committed professional misconduct and/or engaged in conduct unbecoming a lawyer."

The panel's 28-page decision says he "devised a scheme" to "avoid oversight" and wrongfully gain financial benefits.

That included spending thousands of dollars from an endowment fund for his own training at Ivy League schools, and charging the university for thousands more in "false claims of entertaining guests at Winnipeg restaurants [that] amounted to fraud."

While the ruling comes from a regulatory body, the Thursday letter from the law profs to police notes the written decision said "even if the standard had been the criminal standard of beyond a reasonable doubt, the panel would have been satisfied that proof was sufficient."

That, Schulz said, is "really important, because that then suggests that criminal action makes total sense in this case."

No police report filed by U of M

A Winnipeg police spokesperson was unable to confirm to CBC News as of Thursday morning whether the letter had been received by the office of Chief Danny Smyth.

The police service has previously said it never investigated Black-Branch and that the U of M never filed a report with its financial crimes unit. 

The U of M has been criticized by some — including a prominent ethics expert at the university — for not pursuing criminal or civil action against Black-Branch in the past three and half years.

Shortly after Black-Branch left the U of M in early 2020, it said an internal investigation found a senior employee had misspent university funds. The school did not identify that person as Black-Branch at the time.

Schulz and others in the faculty wrote a letter to the law society at the time suggesting they believed the employee was Black-Branch.

The university has said in recent weeks that after exploring its options, it decided the best course of action was to report its concerns to the law society, which regulates the legal profession in Manitoba.

This week's letter to police from the five law professors says they were concerned to hear the U of M isn't planning to pursue legal action.

The professors noted the police service recently said it is cracking down on shoplifting. In light of that, the profs said they wanted to ensure Black-Branch's actions were "brought to the attention of the Winnipeg Police Service."

"After all, Dr. Black-Branch's misconduct was found to have resulted in financial losses amounting to at least hundreds of thousands of dollars, which of course vastly exceeds the loss suffered in a typical shoplifting case," they write.

Following its decision, the Law Society of Manitoba disciplinary panel is expected to hold a hearing to determine what penalty Black-Branch will face, which could include being reprimanded or disbarred.

In an emailed statement, the University of Manitoba said it welcomes the law society's findings.

The university is "engaging with the Winnipeg Police Service and that process is ongoing," but cannot comment further, the statement said.

Read the law professors' letter to Winnipeg police below or here: