Hugo Leal-Neri is a member of SGM's labour law group. He articled with SGM and joined the firm upon his call to the Ontario Bar in 2008. Prior to joining the firm, Hugo interned at the Costa Rica-based Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), where he worked on human rights cases from Guatemala, Mexico, and Nicaragua. He has also done human rights work in Canada and Chile, and sat on the board of directors of the Canadian Centre for International Justice (CCIJ).

Hugo received his law degree from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. As a law student, Hugo did extensive work with the law school’s International Human Rights Clinic, and was awarded the Alexander C. Pathy Q.C. Prize in Labour Relations Law (2006-2007). He also holds a master of laws degree in international human rights and international criminal law from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. As a graduate student, Hugo focused on the subject of transitional justice and wrote a thesis on the prospects for accountability and reconciliation in Mexico with respect to the student massacres of 1968 and 1971, and the human rights abuses committed during the “dirty war” of the 1970s and early 1980s.

Hugo, who also holds a law degree from the Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes in Mexico, has practiced law in that country and remains a member in good standing of the Mexican legal profession.

Hugo is a member of the Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers.