Murray Sinclair, the Anishinaabe judge, senator and university chancellor, who reshaped Canada’s legal system and forced the public to confront the brutal realities of the Indigenous residential school system, has died at the age of 73.
Sinclair – whose spirit name was Mizhana Gheezhik, meaning “The One Who Speaks of Pictures in the Sky” – was a champion of Indigenous rights and reconciliation efforts, dedicating his life to reversing the stark inequities many Indigenous communities face as the result of colonial policy.
Sinclair, Manitoba’s first Indigenous judge, chaired Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which spent six years compiling testimony from survivors of horrific abuses at the country’s residential school system and concluded that Canada had carried out a policy of “cultural genocide”.
“The impact of our dad’s work reached far across the country and the world,” his family said in a statement, confirming his death. “From residential school survivors, to law students, to those who sat across from him in a courtroom, he was always known as an exceptional listener who treated everyone with dignity and respect.”
A sacred fire to help guide his spirit home has been lit outside Manitoba’s legislature, they said.
Tributes poured in from political leaders.
“He was kind, patient and understanding to people like me, who had a lot to learn,” the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, posted on social media.
“With his passing, Canada has lost a giant – a brilliant legal mind, a champion of Indigenous rights, and a trusted leader on our journey of Reconciliation.”
Wab Kinew, the premier of Manitoba, praised Sinclair’s legacy.
“It will be a long time before our nation produces another person the calibre of Murray Sinclair. He showed us there is no reconciliation without truth.”
Marc Miller, who previously served as minister of crown-Indigenous relations, wrote: “I’ll miss you, my friend.”
The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs said Sinclair “broke barriers and inspired countless individuals to pursue reform and justice with courage and determination”.
Sinclair, a member of Peguis First Nation, was born on 24 January 1951 and was a child of the Canadian prairies, growing up in Selkirk, Manitoba. He graduated high school as valedictorian and the year’s top athlete. His postsecondary studies in physical education were cut short when he left school to care for his grandmother.
Sinclair later enrolled in law school, graduating at the top of his class, and was called to the bar in 1980. Less than 10 years later, he became Manitoba’s first Indigenous judge in 1988 and that year was named co-commissioner of Manitoba’s Aboriginal Justice Inquiry.
The inquiry, which looked at the fraught relationship between Indigenous people and the province’s justice system, played a key role in the Gladue principles, a nationwide rewriting of the criminal code which required courts to consider the backgrounds of Indigenous offenders and weigh alternatives to prison when sentencing.
Sinclair was also tasked with leading the historic Truth and Reconciliation Commission which in 2015 concluded that the residential school system amounted to cultural genocide.
Painful survivor testimony to the commission made it clear that sexual, emotional and physical abuse had been rife. The final report estimated that more than 4,100 children died from disease, neglect and suicide, although Sinclair has said he believes the true figure could be as high as 15,000.
In an interview with the Guardian in 2021, Sinclair said the commission was prevented from investigating allegations of criminality and efforts to obtain key church and government records were stymied.
“The government, our social institutions, and even our population acknowledge what was done to Indigenous people was wrong. There have been several apologies and a promise of things will change. But there’s been no change,” he said. “So long as any change is only given reluctantly, it means there remains a willingness, ability – and even desire – to go back to the way things were.”
In 2016, Sinclair was appointed to the Senate and retired in 2021.
The next year, he received the Order of Canada, the country’s top honour, for championing the rights and freedoms of Indigenous people.
He used the award to highlight the need for all Canadians to fight to end a sustained, decades-long campaign to create and sustain racial inequity.
“It took constant effort to maintain that relationship of Indigenous inferiority and white superiority,” he said. “To reverse that, it’s going to take generations of concerted effort to do the opposite.”
Sinclair is survived by his five children.
