Called to Bar: 1991
Sabri is an arbitrator, mediator, negotiator and litigator.
Sabri has been retained many times as an arbitrator, including through the ICC International Court of Arbitration. He is a director of the Canadian Branch of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and Chair of the Alberta Chapter. He has mediated hundreds of disputes including many large commercial matters.
Sabri has extensive advocacy experience before all levels of court in Alberta and at innumerable administrative and regulatory bodies and in international and domestic arbitrations.
In addition to his practice, Sabri has an interest in teaching. From 2003 to 2010 he was a sessional instructor at the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Law teaching civil procedure. He is also on the Board of Directors of the Legal Education Society of Alberta.
Sabri’s engineering background enables him to understand the technical and practical realities of technology and oil & gas industry clients, and to communicate easily with those clients, regulators and experts. In the energy sector, Sabri represents parties in royalty and operating disputes, as well as ownership and rights claims and at regulatory hearings. He also acts for individuals, corporations and municipalities in respect of environmental contamination, nuisance and reclamation issues and for owners, contractors, engineers, architects and insurers in construction and project litigation, including cases involving some of the largest projects in Alberta.
Sabri practices extensively in employment law. He acts for employers and employees in dismissal cases and brings and defends claims for damages and injunctions in cases involving competition, confidentiality, and fiduciary duties. He acts in discrimination and sexual harassment claims and has been retained to undertake harassment and employee misfeasance investigations. Sabri frequently drafts employment, executive compensation and independent contractor agreements, as well as employment policies.
Sabri also acts in discipline and professional negligence matters. His clients have included judges, lawyers, engineers, accountants, investment advisers, stock and insurance brokers, doctors, paramedics, pharmacists, and others. Sabri has been hired as counsel to professional discipline tribunals as well.
In 1995 Sabri left MacKimmie Matthews, which was then one of the large Calgary firms, to start, along with three others, what is today JSS Barristers. In 2012 he was appointed King’s Counsel. In 2014 Sabri was admitted as a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators.
Sabri has a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Calgary, a law degree from the University of Alberta, and a Master of Laws degree, with a major in dispute resolution, from the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia.
Updated March 2023
