Defending people charged with crimes. Mostly solo or in tiny firms, often paid by legal aid, and in court almost every day.
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What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Established
$95,000
First years, mostly legal aid
$55,000
Well known, private clients
$200,000
Most criminal defence lawyers earn $70,000 to $150,000. A small number with high-profile private clients earn far more. Legal aid rates set the floor for the whole field.
$126 to $158 an hour
What Legal Aid Ontario pays a defence lawyer on a certificate, rising with years of experience (rates from April 2025)
Complex cases pay about $186 an hour. That sounds like a lot until you subtract office rent, insurance, staff and the hours legal aid will not pay for. Private clients pay $250 to $600 an hour, but many people charged with crimes cannot afford that.
$3,000 to $100,000+
Up-front fee for a privately paid case, from a first impaired driving charge to a murder trial
The money is paid before the work starts, because a client who has just been convicted rarely pays afterwards. Many defence lawyers run a mix of private and legal aid files.
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The schooling is identical to any other lawyer: the low end is a three year undergraduate degree and three years of law school at the cheapest tuition, plus the LSAT (Law School Admission Test) and your own licensing fees. The high end is a four year degree and a law school near $35,000 a year. Small criminal firms rarely cover licensing exam fees the way large corporate firms do, so those fees sit inside both numbers here. Articling pay of $40,000 to $60,000 also means the same debt takes longer to clear.
There is no big firm to cover your licensing fees. Many new defence lawyers article at small criminal firms for $40,000 to $60,000, well under what Bay Street pays, while carrying the same student debt.
Mostly none in private practice
Solo and small-firm lawyers buy their own health and dental coverage.
No pension unless you build one
You are self-employed. Save early.
Duty counsel jobs
Legal Aid Ontario employs salaried staff lawyers with a pension and benefits.
Control of your schedule
In theory. In practice the court sets your schedule.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Same licence as every lawyer, then a specialty you mostly learn on your feet in court.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
English and anything that makes you speak in front of people.
Bachelor's degree
3 to 4 years
Criminology, psychology, philosophy and political science are common. Any subject works. Write the LSAT (law school admission test).
Law school (JD, juris doctor)
3 years
Take criminal procedure, evidence, trial advocacy and the Charter. Join the criminal law clinic if your school has one.
Articling
About 1 year
8 to 10 months with a criminal defence firm, a legal clinic, or a Crown attorney office, plus the barrister and solicitor licensing exams. Ontario's Law Practice Program is the alternative to articling.
Called to the bar, then the legal aid panel
First year of practice
Most new defence lawyers join a small firm or go solo, and apply to Legal Aid Ontario's panel so they can take certificate work.
English
Cross-examination is language under pressure.
Drama, debate or public speaking
You will be on your feet in court most days.
Law and civics
How charges, courts and the Charter fit together.
Psychology
Clients, witnesses and juries are all people.
Your provincial law society licenses you and disciplines you. To take legal aid cases in Ontario you must also be accepted onto the Legal Aid Ontario panel, and the most serious cases, such as murder and sexual offences, require a separate panel with more experience. Anyone charged with a crime can also represent themselves, and many do.
A small criminal firm
The classic route. Low pay, fast learning, your own files within months.
Duty counsel
Salaried Legal Aid Ontario lawyers who help unrepresented people in bail and plea courts.
A Crown office first
Some article or work as a prosecutor, then switch sides.
Student legal clinics
Law school clinics handle minor charges under supervision.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Jury trial experience
Lawyers who can run a jury trial are rare and get referred the serious cases.
The serious-matters panel
Legal Aid Ontario's panel for murder and other major cases pays more hours per file.
Appeals
A narrow specialty. Appeal lawyers write more than they talk.
Reputation
Word of mouth from past clients and other lawyers brings private retainers.
A second language
Clients and witnesses often do not speak English as a first language.
A criminal law clinic or moot
Real cross-examination practice before you have a client.
A summer with a defence firm or the Crown
Shows you can handle the material, including disturbing evidence.
Comfort with jails
You will visit clients in custody often.
Crown prosecutors are the lawyers you argue against. They are government employees with a salary, a pension and no need to find clients. Defence lawyers switch to the Crown, and back, more often than you would think. Both sides spend years in the same courtrooms, and many defence lawyers eventually become judges.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Court opens at 9 or 10. You might handle a bail hearing, set a trial date and enter a guilty plea before lunch, sometimes in different courtrooms. Afternoons are jail visits and reading disclosure: police notes, body camera video, witness statements. Evenings are cross-examination prep. Clients and their families call at all hours.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Canada has a single Criminal Code that applies in every province and territory. Unlike the US, where each state writes its own crimes, a defence lawyer in Halifax and one in Vancouver argue the same statute.
Since the Supreme Court's Jordan decision in 2016, a case that takes more than 18 months in provincial court, or 30 months in superior court, is presumed too slow and can be thrown out. Defence lawyers watch that clock closely.
The large majority of criminal charges in Canada end with a withdrawal, a diversion program or a guilty plea. A defence lawyer spends far more time negotiating with the Crown than cross-examining witnesses.
Every defence lawyer gets this question at dinner. The answer: the Crown has to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and the defence lawyer's job is to test that proof. If nobody tests it, innocent people go to prison too.
Last checked September 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students.