Association des juristes italo-canadiens du Québec

Board Members

The AICJQ’s Board is composed of a diverse, experienced group of jurists who oversee the AICJQ’s needs and concerns. Our board members volunteer their time and are united by their passion for servicing the Italian-Canadian legal community.

For more information on how to become a board member or volunteer at the AICJQ, we invite you to email us at info@ajicq.com.

Mtre Philippe Messina
President

Bachelor of Arts in 1974, Concordia University, Loyola Campus, with a major concentration in Political Science; Bachelor of Law in 1977, McGill University; Member of Barreau du Québec 1978; Worked in private practice from 1978 until 1994, when he accepted the position of Director of Judicial Affaires at the City of Saint-Leonard. During this tenor at the City of Saint-Leonard, he occupied the positions of Prosecutor at the Municipal Court of Saint-Leonard, Head of the legal department, City Clerk and Director of Human Resources. In 2000, he was appointed to the "Comité de transition" formed by the Québec government with a mandate to make recommendations to the Minister of Municipal Affaires, on the new structure of the Municipal courts overseeing the merger of the (27) twenty-seven municipal courts on the Island of Montreal into (1) one centralized Municipal Court. With the official merger of municipalities of the island of Montreal in 2001, he accepted a position of Assistant Chief Prosecutor of the newly formed Municipal Court of Ville de Montréal. Mtre Messina is vice president, since 2022 of the National Congress of Italian Canadians. He has been a member of AICJQ since 2005 and its president since 2010.

Mtre Anna Colarusso
Vice-president

Mtre. Anna Colarusso was called to the Barreau du Québec in 1984 and is an associate at Kaperonis & Colarusso. Mtre Colarusso practices in Civil Law, Family law also offering mediation services, Estate law, national and international commerical transactions. She also offers International law services pertaining to Italian law and more specifically, estate law, property law and real estate transactions. You may recognize Mtre. Anna Colarusso who hosted for several years a television show on the Italian community network known as the Angolo Legale. She is a governor of the Fondation Communautaire Canadienne Italienne since 2003, President of the Italian Cultural Center of Quebec, Mtre Anna Colarusso, currently the President of Com.It.Es Montréal and board member since 2003 of the AICJQ and is its vice-president since 2008.

Angelo Iacono
Vice-president

Member of Parliament for Alfred-Pellan since October 2015, Angelo Iacono is a lawyer by trade, a politician by vocation and a humanist by conviction. He is currently one(1) of the Association's vice-president. After studying political science at McGill University, Angelo went on to study civil law at UQAM and obtained a Juris Doctor degree from the University of Ottawa. His openness to the world led him in search of new horizons, completing a certificate from the European Union and its Institutions, as well as a certificate in European Community Law from the Faculty of Law of Lyon, in France. Prior to entering the political arena, Angelo worked briefly in private practice but had most of his career in public service, at Via Rail, Industry Canada, HRSDC, and the Office of the Privacy Commission. Born in Montreal from Italian parents, Angelo is proud of his Italian roots, strong on keeping up with traditions and keen on giving back to the community.

Mtre Mario Spina
Founder & Treasurer

Mtre. Mario Spina (spina inter rosas est) has come a long, a very long way. He is the oldest practicing lawyer in the Italian community. Age has never been an obstacle for him.

His motto : Work is man’s joy and honour.
Mario was born in Boiano (CB) on January 10th, 1942. He came to Canada with his parents and (5) five brothers on March 17th, 1959, on St. Patrick’s Day.
Mario was (17) seventeen years old almost (18) eighteen and was placed in Secondary II at Cardinal Newman High School, Annex St. Dominic. He did not speak English nor French. In 1960/61, he attended St. Pius X High School.
For several years, Mario worked full time as secretary at his parish, Our Lady of Consolata. He was then hired at Eastern Chartered Co. as a clerk. In 1966/1967, and then was accepted at Loyola College and was so ablazed that Mario completed the B.A. degree in (3) three years. At that time, the program was (4) four years and nor at this time were there CEGEPs.
In 1969/1970, Mario was accepted at the Law Faculty of both Ottawa University and at McGill University. He decided to attend only the 1st year, McGill
In the summer of 1970, he went to study French for (4) four weeks at the Alliance Française in Paris and in the summer of 1971, he pursued French studies at Université de Montréal for (6) six weeks. He was also a part-time teacher at elementary and high school. In 1971/1972, Mario finally decided to become an advocate and left for Florence, Italy. He chose Florence because his father had been stationed in Florence to serve in the Italian army.

Mario obtained a Law Degree at the University of Florence in 1975 and also married a Florentine girl, Marina, in the same year. He attended the Université de Montréal and in 1982 he became member of the Barreau du Québec and Mtre Spina joined the law office of Mtre. Manuel Feldman and after his death in 1998, Mario joined the law office of Frankel & Frankel, Hershie and Irwin A.
May 31st, 2017, Il Cittadino Canadese, Italian newspaper, reported as headline: “Mario Spina a lawyer of many talents.” Those who know him may attest this. Mtre Spina could have been a priest, a teacher, an opera singer, a politician, a magician, an acrobat or an accountant. He chose to be a lawyer, as he remembers that his maternal grandfather, Alpine soldier in World War I, used to call him l’avvocatuccio which translates to the the little lawyer when he was a little boy in Italy.
In his legal practice, Mtre. Spina has and is always recommending to his colleagues to solve the one client’s problem and not create other problems: Remember article 20 of the CCP.