The Top 5 Common Mistakes Canadians Make When First Charged with a Crime

You’re being arrested. Your heart’s race. It gets a very daunting experience. The police have you right in their sights. They raided your car. What do you do in this situation? Well, I have found that Canadians in Ontario, for example, make the same common mistakes all the time, and this applies to all sorts of crimes, any type of crime really, and I’m going to count them down today for you so you don’t make these mistakes. Whether you’re arrested truthfully for doing something or a false arrest, you want to act the same way each time.

The first one is resisting arrest or losing your cool. The last thing you want to do in this situation is get confrontational with the police. You want to be polite. You want to follow their directions in terms of guiding you where to go, and just comply and follow yourself to be handcuffed and be put in the police cruiser, for example. Don’t lose your cool. Once you lose your cool, you’re not thinking clearly, and you’re going to make all these mistakes. So take some deep breaths and just shut up. Be quiet, cooperative, and just let them do what you do. So that’s Mistake number five in the countdown.

What’s the next one? Mistake number four, trusting the police that they’re going to give you advice. They are not your friends, your members of public they are not your friends. They’re on the opposite side. Do not ask them for advice. They might say things to like, trust me, if you cooperate with us, it will help you. It’s all lies. They can lie to you. Do not start asking for advice or say, What should I do here? You don’t want to be talking in this situation. That’s a really bad no no, because they might say something to you off the record to get you talking later in that interrogation room, which is going to hurt you. So my advice to you is, do not trust the police in this situation. Just shut up. Be quiet, cooperate. Go into the room, say nothing.

The next one is consenting to a search. The police need reasonable and probable grounds to search you. Okay, now first of all, upon arrest, they are going to be able to pat you down and check for an inventory search their safety and security so that you don’t have knives or weapons. That’s allowed, but if they ask to search your vehicle, for example, or give you a password or search your home, you’re entitled to say, no. They may find evidence of a crime in there, and if you consented it to it, well, you’re out of luck that’s going to be used against you in court, and you may find yourself in bigger hot water. So never consent to a search. If they ask you, do you mind if I look around? You mind if I look in your car? Can you give me your password? No, they need to have a word for that. There are exceptions. They may say, Look, we have grounds to search. And of course, you can’t block them, so just do that. But if they ask you, do not consent to a search. That’s a that’s a real big one. It really varies a lot of people in Canada, Ontario.

The next one, mistake number two, in the count down, talking to the police. When they arrest you, you have the right to remain silent, both under the common law and Canadian Charter rights and freedoms that this is so important. Do not let them build a case, because they’re going to be asking you questions. You’re not going to be thinking clearly. You’re never going to be able to tell the same version of events the same way. You’re going to forget things. You don’t want to be talking to police, so if they ask you questions about what happened, you just say, I’m exercising my right to remain silent, and you shut up. If they bring you into an interrogation room and start asking you questions, you just keep saying, I want to speak to a lawyer. I’m exercising my right to silence. They can sit there and they lie to you. They can talk forever. They can do that, but you say nothing. Just keep repeating that mantra until they finally give up. Okay, that’s so important, and they may keep you in there for a couple hours talking. Oh, this could help you. This could you know might help your case. This is your opportunity to talk to us. Don’t fall for it. That’s a huge error, and counting down to the count one.

Mistake number one, which I call fine, not calling a lawyer. Under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms section 10(b), you have a right to call a lawyer upon arrest or detention, they’re going to read you that right. It’s going to involve legal aid as well, and 1 800 number, so you can call a private lawyer or call legal aid. So call your lawyer, call Legal Aid, follow the advice, and that lawyer is going to tell you the same things I’m telling you to, you know, don’t resist arrest, be polite cooperative, but don’t give a statement to the police. And you can follow their advice. That’s the typical advice given for any case, that you have to be very careful. So they’ll go through things with you. They’ll tell you not to consent to a search if they’re asking for that, that sort of thing, and you need to follow their advice. And I’ll tell you so many people, they don’t follow these rules. They just make the same mistakes over and over, and then they bury themselves in court two years later, because even a truthful witness can never tell the same version of events the same way every time, there’s always going to be inconsistency. I guarantee it. if you start giving it two hours to giving a two hour statement about what happened to you last week, for example, allegation of sexual assault where you’re innocent, you’re never going to be able to tell that story the same way two years later in your trial, and it’s going to bury those inconsistencies. I see it time after time after time. So there you have it. We did the countdown to the top five mistakes that people make upon arrest in Canada.