Fol­low­ing is the full text of the state­ment is­sued by the Min­istry of the­At­tor­ney Gen­er­al on the pass­ing of Dana See­ta­hal, SC, who was as­sas­si­nat­ed this morningin what po­lice have de­scribed as a "pro­fes­sion­al" hit.

We have lost a ti­tan. Dana See­ta­hal SC was a gi­ant among men and women. Her care­free na­ture was matched by her sense of pa­tri­o­tism.

She was a pub­lic spir­it­ed lawyer who served her coun­try in many dif­fer­ent ca­pac­i­ties in­clud­ing as­sis­tant so­lic­i­tor gen­er­al, lec­tur­er, mag­is­trate, pros­e­cu­tor, in­de­pen­dent sen­a­tor, pres­i­dent of the Law As­so­ci­a­tion, news­pa­per colum­nist and au­thor. Hers was a tru­ly un­bi­ased, in­de­pen­dent voice that helped shape pub­lic opin­ion. Every­one re­spect­ed and looked for­ward to hear­ing from her. The wis­dom of her coun­sel pro­vid­ed guid­ance to the na­tion on crit­i­cal is­sues.

Dana had a pierc­ing in­tel­lect and a won­der­ful sense of hu­mour. She was an ex­cel­lent ad­vo­cate in the courts and the con­sum­mate pro­fes­sion­al who was nev­er afraid of hard work. She was mar­ried to her work and ded­i­cat­ed her en­tire life to the le­gal pro­fes­sion. Her prag­mat­ic ap­proach to life was re­flect­ed in her news­pa­per columns where she was able to sim­pli­fy com­plex le­gal mat­ters so that the av­er­age man could un­der­stand the is­sues.

I have lost a dear friend and col­league. Our last con­ver­sa­tion was about her col­umn in yes­ter­day's Ex­press. It pro­vid­ed sup­port for me in the present con­tro­ver­sy over the let­ter from the so­lic­i­tor gen­er­al. She was one of the few who came out in my de­fence and sup­port­ed my po­si­tion. It is a pow­er­ful re­minder of the strength of her in­de­pen­dence as she was not afraid to voice her opin­ion even if it meant swim­ming against the tide - she stood up for her be­liefs.

The Min­istry of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al has lost a crit­i­cal sup­port as Dana was as­sist­ing me with im­por­tant and sen­si­tive work on a num­ber of leg­isla­tive mea­sures to help with the fight against crime and im­prove the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice. She was in­stru­men­tal in the new law to abol­ish pre­lim­i­nary in­quiries and changes to the DNA Act. Last week, she helped us or­gan­ise a work­shop on plea bar­gain­ing with ex­perts from the US.

Her death will leave a void in so­ci­ety and the le­gal pro­fes­sion. These are big shoes to fill. She was one of a kind. May her soul rest in peace.