Programmation et conférenciers

Karim Benyekhlef has been a professor in the Faculty of Law at the Université de Montréal since 1989. He has been seconded to the Centre de recherche en droit public since 1990 and served as its Director from 2006 to 2014. He was also the Director of the Regroupement stratégique Droit, changements et gouvernance (Strategic Law, Change and Governance Group), which brings together some 50 researchers, from 2006 to 2014. At the same time, he was the Scientific Director of the Centre d’études et de recherches internationales de l’Université de Montréal (CÉRIUM – the Université de Montréal’s International Research and Study Centre) from 2009 to 2012. He is now the Director of the Cyberjustice Laboratory, which he founded in 2010. The Cyberjustice Laboratory has obtained in 2015 the award «Mérite Innovation» from the Bar of Quebec (Innovation Award). He holds the Chaire de recherche en information juridique Lexum (Lexum Research Chair on Legal Information) and serves as a member of CÉRIUM’s science and advisory committees. He received in 2016 from the Bar of Quebec the distinction Advocatus Emeritus.

Mireille Hildebrandt is Emeritus Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussels (VUB), where she was appointed by the VUB Research Council on the subject of ‘Interfacing Law and Technology’. She has been co-Director of the Research Group on Law Science Technology and Society studies (LSTS) at the Faculty of Law and Criminology from 2019-2024. She is also Emeritus Professor of ‘Smart Environments, Data Protection and the Rule of Law’ at the Science Faculty, at the Institute for Computing and Information Sciences (iCIS) at Radboud University Nijmegen.

Her research interests concern the implications of automated decisions, machine learning and mindless artificial agency for law and the rule of law in constitutional democracies.

Hildebrandt has published 5 scientific monographs, 23 edited volumes or special issues, and over 120 chapters and articles in scientific journals and volumes. She received an ERC Advanced Grant for her project on ‘Counting as a Human Being in the era of Computational Law’ (2019-2024) for COHUBICOL.

Nicolas Vermeys, LL. D. (Université de Montréal), LL. M. (Université de Montréal), CISSP, is the Director of the Centre de recherche en droit public (CRDP), the Associate Director of the Cyberjustice Laboratory, and a Professor at the Université de Montréal’s Faculté de droit.

Mr. Vermeys is a member of the Quebec Bar, as well as a certified information system security professional (CISSP) as recognized by (ISC)2, and is the author of numerous publications relating to the impact of technology on the law, including Droit codifié et nouvelles technologies : le Code civil (Yvon Blais, 2015), and Responsabilité civile et sécurité informationnelle (Yvon Blais, 2010).

Mr. Vermeys’ research focuses on legal issues pertaining to artificial intelligence, information security, developments in the field of cyberjustice, and other questions relating to the impact of technological innovations on the law. He is often invited to speak on these topics by the media, and regularly lectures for judges, lawyers, professional orders, and government organizations, in Canada and abroad.

Arnaud Latil is a senior lecturer at Sorbonne University, a researcher at the SND Center (Sciences, Norms, Democracy, UMR 8011) and a member of the SCAI (Sorbonne Cluster for AI). He is the author of Le droit du numérique, une approche par les risques (Digital Law: A Risk-Based Approach), Dalloz, 2nd ed., 2024). He is an expert advisor to the European AI Office (European Commission).

Bertrand Gervais, B.A.A., LL.B., has been a member of the Quebec Bar since 2003. Since 2015, he has held the position of Director of the Registry and Registrar of Appeals at the Montreal headquarters of the Quebec Court of Appeal. He oversees the planning, coordination, and continuous improvement of registry services, while liaising between the judiciary and court staff. He also works on the Quebec Ministry of Justice’s Lexius project, which aims to establish a fully electronic court system. Mr. Gervais holds a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Montreal and a bachelor’s degree in business administration from HEC Montreal. He has also held various coordination and management positions within the Court of Appeal, including Acting Director General, Research Service Coordinator, and Research Lawyer. Committed to the legal community, he is a member of several committees of the Montreal Bar Association.

Amy Salyzyn is a Professor at the Faculty of Law, Common Law Section at the University of Ottawa. Amy is an expert in the area of legal ethics, lawyer regulation, the use of technology in the delivery of legal services and access to justice. At the University of Ottawa, she teaches Torts as well as upper year seminars in legal ethics and the use AI in the legal profession. Amy is called to the bar in Ontario and is currently the Board Chair of the Canadian Association for Legal Ethics. Before coming to the University of Ottawa, Amy served as a judicial law clerk at the Court of Appeal for Ontario and practiced at a Toronto litigation boutique. Her litigation practice included a wide variety of civil and commercial litigation matters including breach of contract, tort, professional negligence, securities litigation and employment law as well as administrative law matters. Amy received her J.S.D. and LL.M. from Yale Law School and her J.D. from the University of Toronto Law School, where she was awarded the Dean’s Key upon graduation.

Aimé Toumelin is CEO and co-founder of Hadaly. Hadaly is reshaping mergers and acquisitions for small and mid-sized businesses. In 2025 alone, the platform is powering over 150 active business processes, helping advisors, brokers, and entrepreneurs streamline due diligence and deal execution. To date, Hadaly has already supported transactions totaling more than $500 million.

By leveraging artificial intelligence, Hadaly automates the structuring of financial and legal documents, organizes data rooms, and generates high-value outputs such as valuations reports, Confidential Information Memorandums (CIMs), and risk dashboards. These capabilities reduce costs, accelerate timelines, and improve decision-making in transactions.
Hadaly’s mission is to democratize access to advanced M&A tools, enabling faster, more transparent, and more efficient transactions that empower sellers, buyers, and advisors across the SME ecosystem.

Jane Bailey, Full Professor of Law at uOttawa, teaches Cyberfeminism, Technoprudence and Contracts. Her research focuses on technology and human rights, including technology facilitated gender-based violence.  She is a co-investigator and co-Team Leader for The Autonomy through Cyberjustice Technologies Project, centred at the Université de Montréal. Together with Dr Jacquelyn Burkell she co-leads The Rethinking Consent Project, a four-year initiative that explores challenges to the individual consent model posed by technologies such as AI and forensic genetics, seeking just publicly accountable alternatives.  Jane is also a Research Fellow at the Centre for Protecting Women Online at The Open University in England, and a Faculty Member of the Centre for Law, Technology & Society at the University of Ottawa.

Dr. Leah Wing is Director, National Center for Technology and Dispute Resolution (NCTDR) and Senior Lecturer II, Department of Legal Studies Program, University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA. Co-founder and Vice President, Board of Directors of the International Council for Online Dispute Resolution (ICODR), Leah co-led the development of the NCTDR-ICODR ODR Standards that were adopted by the International Organization for Standardization for its ODR standard: ISO 32122 (2025). Leah served as a researcher on early experiments in online dispute resolution and her present research projects focus on ODR ethics and AI. She recently published Wing, L., Draper, C. Cooper, S., and Rainey, D. Governing Artificial Intelligence. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill Nijhoff, 2025. Leah serves on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Online Dispute Resolution and Conflict Resolution Quarterly and as a trainer and consultant, she has worked with hundreds of agencies and organizations both in the U.S. and internationally.

Professor of Sociology at Sciences Po. Doctorate in Sociology from the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS, 1987), degree in Linguistics (Rennes 2, 1991), HDR in Information and Communication Sciences (Bordeaux 3, 1995). He was a university professor at the University of Technology of Compiègne (UTC) and director of the Costech research unit (1997-2005). He was also the founder and director of the CNRS LUTIN User Lab (Laboratory for Digital Information Technology Uses) joint services unit at the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie de la Villette (2004-2007) and director of the Laboratory of Anthropology and Sociology (LAS) at the University of Rennes 2 (2005-2008). He is often described as a “research entrepreneur” due to his past experience as a business leader, lab creator, leader of multi-partner projects (ANR or European) and partner of companies in his research projects. He is executive director of the Idefi Forccast project (training in the analysis of science and technology through controversy mapping) (2012-2019) and head of digital education at Sciences Po (with Pascale Leclercq).

Hannes Westermann is Assistant Professor of Law and Artificial Intelligence at Maastricht University and the Maastricht Law and Tech Lab. His research focuses on the use of AI and generative AI to improve access to justice. He obtained his PhD from the Université de Montréal and the Cyberjustice Laboratory, where he developed JusticeBot, an innovative online platform that provides legal information to laypeople using AI. The platform has been used over 40,000 times. He has presented his research findings at international conferences and was awarded the “Best Paper Award” at JURIX 2020 and 2023. His work has also been featured in the Financial Times and Context.news.

Erik Bornmann is the Director, Guided Pathways at CLEO (Community Legal Education Ontario / Éducation juridique communautaire Ontario), where he leads the development of interactive legal tools that help people navigate legal processes, including completing court and tribunal forms. CLEO’s Guided Pathways support users in areas such as family law, small claims, housing, social security appeals, and immigration. Erik also oversees CLEO’s legal tech research, including a Law Foundation of Ontario–funded project exploring the responsible use of AI to enhance these tools. His work includes collaborations with Canadian universities though Autonomy through Cyberjustice Technologies (ACT) Project and otherwise to evaluate the effectiveness of direct-to-public legal applications. Before joining CLEO, Erik practiced litigation at a community legal clinic, where he appeared before courts and tribunals and led a digital innovation initiative aimed at expanding service capacity across Ontario’s legal clinic system.

Jacquelyn Burkell is a Professor in the Faculty of Information and Media Studies and Associate Vice President, Research, at the University of Western Ontario. Her research focuses on the social impact of technology, examining how technological mediation changes social interaction and information behaviour. She is a co-investigator on the Autonomy Through Cyberjustice SSHRC Partnership grant, and was also a co-investigator on the eQuality Project, a SSHRC Partnership grant focusing on youth equality and privacy online. Her current research focuses on informed consent, and she is a collaborator on a SSHRC Insight Grant focused on challenges to the individual model of consent for the release of personal information. She works collaboratively with colleagues in law, sociology, engineering, and multiple other disciplines. She thrives on the excitement and challenge of interdisciplinary research, and is particularly interested in bringing empirical work from Psychology and Sociology into dialogue with legal and policy issues, in order to inform effective and appropriate responses to some of the challenges of our changing digital environment.

Catherine McKinnon obtained her LL.B. from the University of Toronto and was called to the Ontario Bar in 1994. She joined Justice Canada in 1995. Her work in areas of social policy, diversity and equality, and judicial affairs fostered an early interest in access to justice, including as lead counsel on Unified Family Court expansion and supporting the National Action Committee on Access to Justice in Civil and Family Matters. In 2019 Catherine was delighted to join the Department’s Access to Justice Secretariat. She now leads the Secretariat’s collaborative efforts to advance a people-centred approach to justice and the full realization of Sustainable Development Goal 16, with its vision of equal access to justice for all.

Giampiero Lupo is a researcher of ISASI-CNR and has previously worked and collaborated with IGSG-CNR, the University of Bologna, and the University of Siena. He received his PhD in Political Science-Comparative and European Politics from the University of Siena. Through his research and technical assistance work, he has gained over ten years of experience in the development and study of the impact of ICT technologies in judicial systems. In this field, he coordinates CNR research units in projects funded by the European Commission, such as e-CODEX (development of a European electronic platform for the exchange of legal data), IDEA (development of an AI system for the digitization of labor law procedures), and LINK (development of a blueprint for the digitization of support and protection procedures for children victims with disabilities), as well as projects funded by national funds such as SEVeso (study of protection services supporting victims of environmental crimes). He is also the principal investigator of the Meta-Just project, which studies and develops a virtual court based on the application of metaverse technologies. In his research and technical assistance work, he has collaborated and continues to collaborate with national and international public entities such as the Italian Ministry of Justice, DGSIA (Directorate General for Automated Information Systems), various Ministries of Justice in Europe, CEPEJ (European Commission for the Efficiency of Justice), the Embassy of Canada, and the University of Montreal. He has been a member of the AIAB (Artificial Intelligence Advisory Board) established by CEPEJ to conduct consultation and research activities on AI and justice in Council of Europe countries. He is the author and co-author of more than 20 scientific publications in conferences, workshops, international journals, and books on topics related to the use and impact of ICT technologies in judicial systems, ethical issues of Artificial Intelligence, ICT and e-justice assessment tools, victims’ access to justice, and quality of justice.

Ayelet Sela is a lecturer (assistant professor) at the Faculty of Law, Bar-Ilan University, and a non-resident fellow at Stanford Law School’s Deborah L. Rhode Center on the Legal Profession. Her research focuses on dispute system design, procedural justice, and access to justice within courts, tribunals, and other dispute resolution mechanisms. Dr. Sela’s work particularly examines the impact of online and hybrid procedural frameworks, exploring how justice systems can harness technology and procedural innovations to better serve self-represented individuals and improve outcomes. As a founding member of the BIU LawData Lab, she collaborates with data scientists to apply computational methods to legal data and to evaluate the use of AI in regulatory and court-related contexts. Dr. Sela earned her JSD and JSM from Stanford Law School and her LL.B from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Karine Gentelet is Full Professor of Social Sciences at the Université du Québec en Outaouais (UQO) and Scientific Director of collaborations with civil society for OBVIA (Observatoire international des impacts sociétaux de l’AI et du numérique). In 2020-2022, She was holder of the Professorship Chair on Social justice and AI Abeona-Ens-Obvia. Her research interests and publications focus on impacts of artificial intelligence technologies on social justice, civil participation and human rights, including First Peoples’, on research ethics in Indigenous context.

Professor Fabien Gélinas, Ad. E., teaches and conducts research in the areas of international dispute resolution, common law and civil law contracts, commercial law, law and technology, and legal theory. Formerly General Counsel of the International Court of Arbitration, he acts as arbitrator, expert and consultant on dispute resolution and legal reform.

Professor Gélinas is a cofounder of the Montreal Cyberjustice Laboratory. He has taught at the Centre d’études diplomatiques et stratégiques de Paris (École des hautes études internationales), the Université de Paris II – Panthéon Assas, the National University of Rwanda in Butare, Trinity College Dublin, Sciences Po Paris, New York University and the National University of Singapore.

Jane Bailey, Full Professor of Law at uOttawa, teaches Cyberfeminism, Technoprudence and Contracts. Her research focuses on technology and human rights, including technology facilitated gender-based violence. She is a co-investigator and co-Team Leader for The Autonomy through Cyberjustice Technologies Project, centred at the Université de Montréal. Together with Dr Jacquelyn Burkell she co-leads The Rethinking Consent Project, a four-year initiative that explores challenges to the individual consent model posed by technologies such as AI and forensic genetics, seeking just publicly accountable alternatives. Jane is also a Research Fellow at the Centre for Protecting Women Online at The Open University in England, and a Faculty Member of the Centre for Law, Technology & Society at the University of Ottawa.

Jacquelyn Burkell is a Professor in the Faculty of Information and Media Studies and Associate Vice President, Research, at the University of Western Ontario. Her research focuses on the social impact of technology, examining how technological mediation changes social interaction and information behaviour. She is a co-investigator on the Autonomy Through Cyberjustice SSHRC Partnership grant, and was also a co-investigator on the eQuality Project, a SSHRC Partnership grant focusing on youth equality and privacy online. Her current research focuses on informed consent, and she is a collaborator on a SSHRC Insight Grant focused on challenges to the individual model of consent for the release of personal information. She works collaboratively with colleagues in law, sociology, engineering, and multiple other disciplines. She thrives on the excitement and challenge of interdisciplinary research, and is particularly interested in bringing empirical work from Psychology and Sociology into dialogue with legal and policy issues, in order to inform effective and appropriate responses to some of the challenges of our changing digital environment.

Professor Fabien Gélinas, Ad. E., teaches and conducts research in the areas of international dispute resolution, common law and civil law contracts, commercial law, law and technology, and legal theory. Formerly General Counsel of the International Court of Arbitration, he acts as arbitrator, expert and consultant on dispute resolution and legal reform.

Professor Gélinas is a cofounder of the Montreal Cyberjustice Laboratory. He has taught at the Centre d’études diplomatiques et stratégiques de Paris (École des hautes études internationales), the Université de Paris II – Panthéon Assas, the National University of Rwanda in Butare, Trinity College Dublin, Sciences Po Paris, New York University and the National University of Singapore.

Jinzhe Tan is a PhD student in Artificial Intelligence and Law at the Faculty of Law of the University of Montreal. His research explores the intersection of artificial intelligence and law, with a focus on improving the accessibility of law and promoting technology-assisted dispute resolution. His work also examines how artificial intelligence can help mitigate decision-making deficiencies in the judicial process, thereby contributing to a more equitable and consistent justice system.

Jinzhe has published in leading AI and legal informatics conferences, including ICAIL and JURIX. His research spans multiple dimensions of AI applications in law, from using Large Language Models to structure legal knowledge to employing AI for dispute resolution and layperson legal understanding. His contributions have been recognized internationally, with a co-authored paper receiving the Best Paper Award at JURIX 2023.

Through his work, Jinzhe aims to advance the responsible integration of AI into legal systems, ensuring that technology enhances fairness, consistency, and access to justice.

Gabrielle Boily is pursuing a master’s degree in psychology with a thesis at Laval University. With a bachelor’s degree in law and a bachelor’s degree in psychology completed concurrently, she is interested in the links between these two disciplines. After a semester at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, she began her research career with an article on mental health courts, published after winning the Cahiers de droit essay contest. Her career path then led her to study human-machine interaction, particularly artificial intelligence, as part of her work at the LEILAH Laboratory under the supervision of Professor Alexandre Marois. Her innovative research on the impact of AI on cognitive processes and on the use of AI tools to improve access to justice has received support from Obvia and NSERC in the form of grants, attesting to its scientific and social relevance.