Assault and offences against the person

Assault is the offence Port Ardent officers charge more than any other violent crime, and it comes in every form: a shove outside a bar, a punch in a schoolyard, a slap during an argument at home, a bottle swung at a stranger, a bite, a kick to the head of someone already on the ground. Ms. Liu tells the class that in her office, assault files outnumber every other violence file several times over, and that most of the arguments in court are about three questions: was there really an application of force or a threat, did the victim consent, and how serious was the harm or the weapon. The answers decide whether a case is a simple assault prosecuted summarily or an aggravated assault carrying fourteen years. This lesson covers the definition of assault, consent, the aggravated forms and related offences against the person.

What counts as an assault

Section 265(1) of the Criminal Code defines assault in three ways. A person commits an assault when, without the consent of another person, he or she applies force intentionally to that person, directly or indirectly; when he or she attempts or threatens, by an act or a gesture, to apply force to another person, if he or she has, or causes the other person to believe on reasonable grounds that he or she has, present ability to effect that purpose; or when, while openly wearing or carrying a weapon or an imitation of one, he or she accosts or impedes another person or begs. Section 265(2) says these definitions apply to all forms of assault, including sexual assault and aggravated assault.

The force involved can be slight. Any intentional application of force without consent can be an assault, including a push, a poke in the chest, spitting on someone or throwing a drink at them, and force can be applied indirectly, as by setting a dog on someone or pulling a chair out from under them. The threat form requires more than words alone. A threat must be by an act or gesture, and words can accompany it; a person who says I'm going to punch you while raising a fist commits an assault, but the same words shouted from across a parking lot with no ability to carry them out do not. A threat of future harm, such as I'll get you next week, is not an assault but may be uttering threats under section 264.1.

Consent

Consent turns many touchings that would otherwise be assaults into lawful acts: a handshake, a tackle in a football game, a haircut, surgery. Section 265(3) says no consent is obtained where the complainant submits or does not resist because of the application of force, threats or fear of force, fraud, or the exercise of authority. In R. v. Jobidon (1991), the Supreme Court held that adults cannot consent to the intentional application of force causing serious hurt or non-trivial bodily harm in a fist fight or brawl. Consent to a fair fight is therefore no defence once one participant intends and causes real injury. Consent in sports is limited to the force within the rules and normal conduct of the game: a hockey player consents to body checks but not to a deliberate stick to the head after the whistle. Consent must also come from someone capable of giving it. Children, people who are unconscious or severely intoxicated, and people with some cognitive disabilities may be unable to consent, an issue that becomes central in the sexual offences of lesson 8.

Parents and teachers have a narrow additional protection. Section 43 of the Criminal Code justifies a schoolteacher, parent or person standing in the place of a parent in using force by way of correction toward a child, if the force does not exceed what is reasonable. In Canadian Foundation for Children, Youth and the Law v. Canada (2004), the Supreme Court upheld the section but read strict limits into it: it applies only to minor corrective force of a transitory and trifling nature, never to children under two or teenagers, never with objects such as belts or rulers, never with blows to the head, and teachers may use force only to restrain or remove a child, not to punish. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission called for section 43 to be repealed, and bills to do so have been introduced in Parliament. Officers called to a report of a parent striking a child must assess the force used, the injury, the child's age and the circumstances, and involve child protection services where required.

The aggravated forms of assault

Above simple assault under section 266, which carries up to five years on indictment, the Code builds a ladder of more serious offences. Section 267 makes it an offence, carrying up to ten years, to commit an assault while carrying, using or threatening to use a weapon or an imitation of one, to commit an assault that causes bodily harm, or to choke, suffocate or strangle the complainant, a form added in 2019 because strangulation is a strong predictor of later homicide in intimate partner violence. Bodily harm is defined in section 2 as any hurt or injury that interferes with the health or comfort of the person and that is more than merely transient or trifling in nature; bruises, cuts needing stitches, a broken nose and serious psychological harm can all qualify. Section 268 defines aggravated assault, carrying up to fourteen years, as an assault that wounds, maims, disfigures or endangers the life of the complainant. Section 269 punishes unlawfully causing bodily harm, which covers injuries caused by another unlawful act, such as a dangerous shove that causes a fall. Weapon is defined broadly in section 2 to include anything used, designed to be used or intended for use in causing death or injury or in threatening or intimidating any person, so a beer bottle, a boot or a car can be a weapon depending on how it is used.

The aggravating facts decide the charge, so they must be documented with care. Injuries should be photographed, with a scale, when first seen and again a day or two later, when bruising often becomes more visible. Medical records should be obtained with consent or proper authority, because they describe injuries in clinical detail that can establish bodily harm, wounding or endangering life. Any object used should be seized and described, including how it was held and used, because whether it was a weapon can depend on its use. And in strangulation cases, officers should ask specific questions and look for signs such as voice changes, difficulty swallowing, petechiae, which are tiny red spots in the eyes or on the face, and loss of consciousness or bladder control, because visible marks are often absent.

Assaults on police and other public safety workers

Section 270 makes it an offence to assault a public officer or peace officer engaged in the execution of his or her duty, or a person acting in aid of such an officer, and to assault a person with intent to resist or prevent the lawful arrest or detention of himself or another. Sections 270.01 and 270.02 add aggravated forms for assaults with weapons or causing bodily harm, and for aggravated assaults on peace officers. A key element is that the officer was engaged in the execution of duty, which requires that the officer was acting lawfully. If the officer was making an unlawful arrest or search, the accused may be acquitted of the peace officer offence, though perhaps not of simple assault. The June 2026 sentencing reforms also made assaulting first responders and transit workers an aggravating factor at sentencing.

These provisions exist because officers face assault at rates few other workers do, and because attacks on officers threaten the rule of law itself. But Ms. Liu cautions the class that judges and juries examine these charges closely, and that a charge of assaulting police laid after a struggle that began with an unlawful stop, or that seems to be added to justify force used by the officer, can damage the officer's credibility in every later case. The best protection is a lawful, well-documented reason for every contact, and body-worn camera footage that shows the whole encounter.

Other offences against the person

Several related offences fill out this part of the Code. Kidnapping, under section 279(1), involves confining a person with intent to hold for ransom, send the person out of Canada or hold the person against his or her will, and forcible confinement, under section 279(2), covers confining, imprisoning or forcibly seizing another person without lawful authority, which arises often in intimate partner violence, as when a partner blocks the door or takes away the victim's phone. Administering a noxious thing, under section 245, covers drugging someone's drink. Criminal negligence causing bodily harm, under section 221, covers serious injuries caused by wanton or reckless disregard. And in June 2026, Bill C-225, known as Bailey's Law, created a new offence of violence, threatened violence or attempted violence against an intimate partner, as part of a package of intimate partner violence reforms, some of which come into force on dates set later.

The code below classifies a set of Port Ardent assault files by applying the ladder in order from the most serious level down, which is how a Crown reviews a charge: start with the most serious offence the facts could support, and step down until every element is met.

# Classify an assault file by stepping down the ladder (Criminal Code ss. 266 to 268, simplified)
def classify(f):
    if not f["force_or_threat"] or f["consent_valid"]:
        return "no assault"
    if f["wounds_maims_disfigures_or_endangers_life"]:
        return "aggravated assault, s. 268 (max 14 years)"
    if f["choking"]:
        return "assault by choking, s. 267(c) (max 10 years)"
    if f["weapon"] or f["bodily_harm"]:
        return "assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm, s. 267 (max 10 years)"
    return "assault, s. 266 (hybrid; max 5 years on indictment)"
base = dict(force_or_threat=True, consent_valid=False, weapon=False, bodily_harm=False, choking=False,
            wounds_maims_disfigures_or_endangers_life=False)
files = {
    "shove outside bar, no injury": {},
    "punch, broken nose": {"bodily_harm": True},
    "bottle swung, missed": {"weapon": True},
    "hands on throat during argument": {"choking": True},
    "stabbed in abdomen, surgery": {"weapon": True, "wounds_maims_disfigures_or_endangers_life": True},
    "body check within the rules of hockey": {"consent_valid": True},
}
for name, facts in files.items():
    print(f"{name:40s} -> {classify({**base, **facts})}")

shove outside bar, no injury             -> assault, s. 266 (hybrid; max 5 years on indictment)
punch, broken nose                       -> assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm, s. 267 (max 10 years)
bottle swung, missed                     -> assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm, s. 267 (max 10 years)
hands on throat during argument          -> assault by choking, s. 267(c) (max 10 years)
stabbed in abdomen, surgery              -> aggravated assault, s. 268 (max 14 years)
body check within the rules of hockey    -> no assault

Real classification decisions are more nuanced than a function can capture. Whether a broken nose is bodily harm or a wound, whether a bottle was used as a weapon, and whether a provocation was serious enough are questions of fact for the court. Under Ohio law, for example, a broken nose has been held to be serious physical harm in many cases because it involves temporary substantial incapacity or disfigurement, but not every injury of that type will be. The code is a reminder of the order of the questions, which is the habit Ms. Liu wants the students to take into the field.