More than 100 McGill law students, as well as their student association, are opposing a decision to exclude a man convicted of murder from campus.
Jeffrey George Ewert, who strangled and killed one woman and left another severely disabled in separate incidents in British Columbia in 1984, has been attending McGill’s law school since August, CBC reported on Friday.
Now in his 60s, Ewert is on parole after four decades behind bars.
On Friday, McGill provost Angela Campbell told students Ewert hadn’t been on campus since early October following “measured, decisive action” by the school.
But some within the law school oppose the university’s decision. A petition calling for Ewert’s return to class has gathered more than 120 signatures from current and former law students, while an email from the McGill Law Students’ Association accuses the university of undermining the principle of rehabilitation.
“We are shocked by the reactive manner in which McGill University has responded to this issue,” the association’s executive wrote Saturday in an email obtained by The Gazette.
“As law students, we are taught to recognize the injustices perpetuated by the criminal justice system and to understand the importance of rehabilitation and offenders’ rights,” the email said. “It is therefore especially disappointing when our university, presented with an opportunity to guide us through critical learning, fails.”
The petition, which organizers plan to deliver Monday to university leadership, points to the parole board decision allowing Ewert’s return to the community as evidence that he can participate in class.
“We understand that there’s a duty to keep students safe,” said Raymond Johnson-Brown, one of the law students leading the initiative. But there have been no allegations of wrongdoing by Ewert at McGill, he added.
Students may be uncomfortable with Ewert’s presence in class, he conceded, but “discomfort is not the same as a lack of safety.”
“I personally don’t see somebody who has committed a crime, served (decades in prison) and is now out on day parole as impacting me or my well-being,” Johnson-Brown said. Women’s concerns about Ewert’s history are reasonable, he added, calling on McGill to come up with a response.
In a decision in June to continue his day parole, the Parole Board of Canada acknowledged Ewert has breached his release conditions multiple times since he was first granted day parole in early 2025, including those that pertain to his contacts with women.
Johnson-Brown, who is pursuing a master’s degree in social work alongside his legal studies, said he and other students have become friends with Ewert. On the day he was barred from campus, Johnson-Brown said he and others witnessed two security guards escort Ewert off the premises.
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The petition also references Ewert’s experiences as an Indigenous man, calling his incarceration “inextricable from the colonial institutions in which he was born.”
“Jeff’s situation is where our collective commitments to reconciliation and rehabilitation are tested,” the petition says.
As an infant, Ewert was taken from his home and adopted by a white family. The parole board decision from June said he was “raised in an environment marked by abuse, neglect and racism.”
“That should be taken into consideration in understanding why we got the act of murder … that he committed,” Johnson-Brown said, clarifying that Ewert’s history doesn’t excuse his crimes.
McGill maintains it’s committed to rehabilitation, with Campbell writing Friday that “a past conviction does not on its own bar anyone from studying here.”
The university is reviewing the issue, she said, promising “a fair process that balances the rights and interests of everyone involved.”
The Gazette’s Paul Cherry contributed to this report.
Clarification: Jeffrey George Ewert served four decades in prison and is on parole.