Another photographer arrested in Toronto

(I’m not a lawyer so don’t believe anything I say)

Canada’s Criminal Code includes only Trespassing at Night. During daylight hours, provincial law regulates trespassing.

In general, and it may vary from province to province, there can be implied permission to walk on someone else’s property. Or to reverse it, if a property has a “No Trespassing” sign or a closed fence around the property, then there is no implied permission.

Most(?) properties have a driveway or some sort of walkway up to the door or at least onto the property. This can be implied permission. For example, the mail delivery person can walk onto a property to deliver mail and a telephone or TV-cable person can walk onto a property to service a cable. Certainly these people have a lawful reason to enter a property. But anyone can walk onto a property to knock on the door or, I suppose, just to get a closer look at a garden.

If a property is fenced in, I don’t know if a gate has to be locked or simply closed in order to remove implied permission to enter.

There is implied permission for public property such as parks, sidewalks, roads, a public square at city hall, etc.

Implied permission ends if a property owner or their designate tells the person to get lost or if a police officer issues a lawful order to vacate the property.

There is implied permission to enter private property such as a shopping mall, a restaurant and almost every other business and office building. This permission ends when the property owner tells you to leave and they can tell you to leave for any reason whatsoever.

Here in Ontario, the property owner or their designate can arrest a trespasser. They then must turn the person over to police. This is what happened to Chris Young, as mentioned in the first post above. He was arrested by Toronto’s private security and turned over to police. Trespass in Ontario is usually a fine and it may also include legal costs and damages, if any. The property owner could choose to sue the trespasser for damages, if any.

Trespassing can be more complicated than what I’ve just written. It usually comes down to whether or not you had a lawful reason for being on a property.

Trespassing at Night is a criminal charge but during daylight hours, it’s not. Go figure. 🙂

I doubt they teach this in photojournalism school but they should. Every (photo)journalist needs to know about trespass laws as well as libel and privacy laws.