Sharon Shore is now cleared to practise law and get on with her life.

A panel declared Friday that the 50-year-old law student meets the good character requirements to practise law despite her decision to withhold evidence from 1998 legal proceedings against two nurses accused of criminal negligence in her daughter's death.

"Sharon E. Shore is of good character and (should) be admitted as a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada," said panelist Joanne St. Lewis who, with colleagues Heather Ross and Anne Marie Doyle, spent a week examining Shore's character through written statements and verbal testimony.

"I am elated," Shore said after the decision was announced.

"I am so happy to be found of good character and will be admitted to the bar and will be allowed to practise."

Shore's daughter Lisa died unexpectedly on Oct. 22, 1998 after she was administered morphine at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children.

Earlier, after breaking a leg and suffering chronic pain, Lisa had been treated at a Boston hospital where a neurologist wrote a three-page report.

Shore disagreed with its conclusions.

When the two Toronto nurses were charged, Shore was asked to turn over documents related to her daughter's treatment but she threw out the neurologist's report.

Upon learning that Shore intended to become a lawyer, prominent Toronto lawyers Marlys Edwardh and Liz McIntyre made a complaint to the law society alleging that withholding evidence made Shore unfit to practise in Ontario.

At the hearing, Shore repeatedly acknowledged remorse for her actions, reiterating what she did was "wrong."

"My biggest single regret is that I did it," she said.

In the panel's decision, St. Lewis said evidence related to character is "multi-faceted."

That included testimony that Shore's behaviour with the document was "out of character" and improper at that time but that she is of "good character" today.

Charges against the nurses were withdrawn.

They each pleaded guilty last September at the College of Nurses of Ontario to a single count of professional misconduct for failing to properly assess and monitor Lisa. They each received one-month suspensions.

Frank Gomberg, a lawyer and friend of Shore, said the admissions hearing "should have never happened."

"I've never ever represented a client who has more integrity, passion, honesty and commitment than Sharon Shore," Gomberg said.

"The decision of the panel is a complete vindication of Sharon Shore in all respects."

Flanked by Gomberg and her husband Bill, Shore dabbed away tears when St. Lewis read part of the decision addressing the facts of her daughter's demise, and the unexpected death of Shore's father a month after Lisa's death.

"I knew all along," said Barbara Grief, Shore's mother, of the panel's decision.

"A mother always knows about her child."