Experienced Criminal Lawyers

What to Do When Police Is At Your Door?

What do I do if the police are at my door?

Our criminal lawyers in Alberta understand this can be a frantic and scary time. Remaining calm is highly recommended. It is important to understand that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and judicial interpretation of these rights are meant to protect you in these circumstances.

You have the right to remain silent when confronted by the police. In this situation, you do not have any obligation to answer the door or invite the police into your home. In Canada, there is an implied invitation to approach your door and to knock in order to seek communication with the occupants of the residence. However, it is important to understand the implied invitation principle stops at the threshold of the door. This means that unless the police are present with a warrant, you have no obligation to answer the door or communicate after they knock and announce themselves.

Can the police enter my residence?

The answer is yes in certain circumstances. There is a special warrant called a “Feeney Warrant” that the police can apply for and, if granted, will allow them to enter the residence even if you do not answer and do not consent to their presence. A Feeney warrant is usually obtained after a police officer submits an affidavit to a judicial officer, which demonstrates there are reasonable and probable grounds to effect an arrest and that the arrestable person is inside the dwelling home (residence). Once this criterion is met, a Feeney warrant is likely to be granted. After the police are in possession of the warrant, they must knock and announce themselves. They are required to announce the reason for requiring entry into the residence. Finally, they must attempt to gain admission into the residence first before ramming the door in or causing any other damage. However, there are three exceptions that will allow a police officer to enter the residence without such a warrant. These are:

• If an occupant of the dwelling home consents to the police entry;
• There are exigent circumstances;
• The officer is in pursuit of an individual attempting to make an arrest.

If the police attend at your door with a warrant, you are legally obligated to comply by allowing them to enter the dwelling home. However, it is best if you remain silent at this point and take no further actions.

 

What should I know before I consent to allowing the police enter my residence?

Consenting to a police officer entering a residence can be expressed or implied. Ultimately, the person who gives consent must have the authority to do so. Consenting to a police officer entering the residence must be voluntary and therefore not the product of police oppression, coercion or other external conduct that negates the freedom to deny entry into the residence. The person giving consent must be aware of his or her right to refuse entry. Finally, the person giving consent must be aware of the potential consequences of giving consent. These factors come from our common law and have been recently applied in our Provincial Court. It is important to note that consent is invalid if the police mislead the consenting occupant of the reason they seek entry. Furthermore, consent can be revoked at any time.

 

What are these “exigent circumstances” that will allow a police officer to enter my residence without a warrant?

Exigent circumstances is a judicially considered phrase that will allow a police officer to enter a residence without a warrant in order to “to prevent imminent bodily harm or death, or to prevent the imminent loss or destruction of evidence.”

Section 529.3(2) sets out the exigent circumstances and states:

Authority to enter a dwelling without a warrant

529.3 (1) Without limiting or restricting any power a peace officer may have to enter a dwelling-house under this or any other Act or law, the peace officer may enter the dwelling-house for the purpose of arresting or apprehending a person, without a warrant referred to in section 529 or 529.1 authorizing the entry, if the peace officer has reasonable grounds to believe that the person is present in the dwelling-house, and the conditions for obtaining a warrant under section 529.1 exist but by reason of exigent circumstances, it would be impracticable to obtain a warrant.

Exigent circumstances

(2) For the purposes of subsection (1), exigent circumstances include circumstances in which the peace officer

(a) has reasonable grounds to suspect that entry into the dwelling-house is necessary to prevent imminent bodily harm or death to any person; or

(b) has reasonable grounds to believe that evidence relating to the commission of an indictable offence is present in the dwelling-house and that entry into the dwelling-house is necessary to prevent the imminent loss or imminent destruction of the evidence.

The Alberta Court of Appeal has considered this section and has concluded in R v TAV, 2001 ABCA 316 at para 24:

“Exigent” indicates in dictionary usage, the “requiring of immediate action or aid; pressing, urgent” or “[a] state of pressing need; a time of extreme necessity; a critical occasion, or one that requires immediate action or remedy; an emergency, extremity, strait”: R. v. Rao (1984), 1984 CanLII 2184 (ON CA), 46 O.R. (2d) 80 (C.A.) at 102. Practically speaking, this involves the presence of “emergency-like circumstances as for example the presence of weapons in a motor vehicle stopped on a highway” or where “police action literally must be ‘now or never’ to preserve the evidence of the crime”: Black’s Law Dictionary. Therefore, in the case of a warrantless search of a home, exigent circumstances may permit the search where it is necessary to prevent imminent bodily harm or death, or where it is necessary to prevent imminent loss or destruction of evidence: R. v. Cardinal, 2001 ABPC 92, [2001] A.J. No 672 (Prov. Ct.); R. v Grant, 1993 CanLII 68 (SCC), [1993] 3 S.C.R. 223.

This exception may arise, for example, when the police are responding to a 911 call, but the caller disconnects and is not answering or is not reachable. If the police enter your residence on this exceptional basis and then seize items or this leads to a different investigation or arrest, it is important to speak to your lawyer and discuss the “plain view doctrine.”

What is the “hot pursuit” exception and how does it work?

The last common law exception is the “hot pursuit” exception, as stated above. This common law exception allows the police to pursue an individual for arrest and prevents the person from avoiding this arrest by entering his or her residence or the home of another party.

The jurisprudence (judicial interpretation of this common law exception) has defined this pursuit as a “continuous pursuit” so that the pursuit and the capture are within the commission of the offence and are part of a single transaction. In the Feeney decision, the Supreme Court of Canada concluded that in “cases of hot pursuit, the privacy interest must give way to the interest of society in ensuring adequate police protection.”

When this doctrine is invoked in order to justify the warrantless entry, there must be an immediate connection between the commission of the alleged offence, the pursuit of the alleged offender, and that person’s arrest. This is an exception to the general rule and cannot be used to justify warrantless entries on a regular basis and can only arise in unique circumstances.

Final thoughts on what you should know if the police are at your door

It is understandable that most people think that cooperation with the police is the best idea. However, there are often times when this isn’t your best interest. It is best to determine why the police are at your door. In some cases, it may have little to do with you or the occupants of your residence. They may be investigating something unrelated to you, or it may be a community outreach reason. However, if the officer is investigating anything related to you or the activities in your home, it is best to remain silent and not let the officer enter unless he or she has a warrant (lawful authority to enter). Following any such encounter, you should immediately contact a knowledgeable and competent criminal defence lawyer before speaking to the police again.