Criminal Harassment Charges in Alberta: What You're Actually Facing

Criminal harassment is the offence most often referred to in everyday language as "stalking." A significant portion of criminal harassment files in Alberta arise out of relationship breakdowns — separations, custody disputes, the breakdown of intimate or workplace relationships — and many proceed on the domestic dockets alongside related family law proceedings. The conduct that supports the charge is often conduct that, in another context, would be unremarkable: messages, calls, visits, attempts to reconnect. What turns it into a criminal offence is the pattern of the conduct, the absence of consent on the other side, and its effect on the complainant — or, for conduct on or after July 18, 2026, the effect it could reasonably be expected to have.

Section 264 of the Criminal Code was rewritten on July 18, 2026, and which version applies depends on when the conduct happened. This page explains both versions: the five forms of prohibited conduct under the current s. 264(2); the objective test that now governs; the five-part test set by the Alberta Court of Appeal in R v Sillipp, 1997 ABCA 346, which still governs conduct before that date; what happens when the alleged conduct spans the change; the way the intimate-partner-violence dockets in Alberta treat these files; the digital evidence and Charter framework that governs disclosure in these prosecutions; and the procedural and substantive defences that engage. KJR Law represents people facing criminal harassment charges across Calgary and Southern Alberta.

Do Not Give a Statement Before You Speak with a Lawyer

The instinct in a criminal harassment file is to explain. To clarify that the messages were not threatening. To put the contact in context. To describe the prior relationship. The instinct is, in almost every case, wrong. Statements given to police become the Crown's evidence — and "context" provided to investigators frequently establishes the very elements the prosecution would otherwise have to prove. You are not obliged to give the police a statement. Once a person is arrested or detained, s. 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects the right to choose whether to speak to the authorities (R v Hebert, [1990] 2 SCR 151), and s. 10(b) gives the right to retain and instruct counsel without delay and to be told of that right. Call a lawyer first. The conversation, if it should happen, can be prepared properly later.

The July 18, 2026 Amendments — Which Version of Section 264 Applies

On July 18, 2026, the Protecting Victims Act (S.C. 2026, c. 19, s. 27) rewrote the offence of criminal harassment. The main changes:

• An objective test. The former section required proof that the conduct actually caused the complainant to fear, reasonably, for their safety. The current s. 264(1) asks instead whether, in all the circumstances, the conduct "could reasonably be expected to cause" the person to believe that their safety, or the safety of anyone known to them, is threatened. The Crown no longer has to prove that the complainant was in fact afraid.
• Psychological safety. New s. 264(6) provides, "for greater certainty," that a person's safety includes their psychological safety.
• A new mental-state route. The Crown may now prove that the accused acted "with intent to harass," as an alternative to knowledge or recklessness.
• A fifth form of conduct. New s. 264(2)(a.1) covers monitoring the location, movements, actions or social interactions of the person or anyone known to them.
• Wider threatening conduct. Section 264(2)(d) formerly reached threatening conduct directed at the complainant "or any member of their family." It now reaches threatening conduct directed at the complainant "or at anyone or any animal known to them."
• Any means. Section 264(2) now states expressly that the conduct may be done "in person, by a means of telecommunication or by any other means."

The date of the conduct decides which version applies. The new elements apply only to conduct on or after July 18, 2026. Conduct before that date is measured against the former s. 264 — including the requirement that the complainant actually feared for their safety, and the narrower family-member wording of paragraph (d). Section 11(g) of the Charter prohibits a conviction for an act that was not an offence when it was done, and changes to the elements of an offence operate prospectively.

Conduct that spans July 18, 2026. Criminal harassment is usually alleged as a course of conduct over weeks or months, and many files now before the courts involve conduct that began before July 18 and continued after it. Two points are clear: conduct before July 18 cannot be judged by the new objective test, and conduct entirely after July 18 is judged under the current section. Earlier conduct can generally be put before the court as context — the history of the relationship bears on "all the circumstances" — subject to the usual limits on evidence of other discreditable conduct. What has not been decided is whether a charge under the current section can rely on conduct before July 18 to establish repetition under paragraphs (a) or (b), or the pattern as a whole, and which test governs a single count whose date range crosses July 18. The defence position is that any conduct before July 18 that the Crown relies on as part of the offence must meet the former elements, actual fear included. The same question affects the post-sentence no-contact order in s. 729.2, which applies only to offences committed on or after July 18, 2026. The date range in the charge, and how the Crown frames it, is one of the first things we review.

The Section 264 Framework — Five Forms of Prohibited Conduct

Section 264(2) of the Criminal Code identifies the forms of conduct that, if combined with the other elements of the offence, constitute criminal harassment. For conduct on or after July 18, 2026, there are five, and each may be done in person, by telecommunication, or by any other means. For earlier conduct there were four — paragraph (a.1) did not exist — and paragraph (d) was narrower. The Crown must establish that the accused engaged in at least one of them:

• Section 264(2)(a) — repeatedly following the complainant or anyone known to them from place to place.
• Section 264(2)(a.1) (conduct on or after July 18, 2026) — monitoring the location, movements, actions or social interactions of the complainant or anyone known to them. This is the paragraph aimed at tracking apps, location-sharing, account access and social-media surveillance. Unlike paragraphs (a) and (b), it does not say "repeatedly." Whether a single act of monitoring can be enough, by the same reasoning courts have applied to paragraph (d), has not yet been decided.
• Section 264(2)(b) — repeatedly communicating with, either directly or indirectly, the complainant or anyone known to them. Communication "indirectly" through third parties or via social media is covered. Modern files frequently turn on text messages, email, social media posts, indirect messages sent through mutual contacts, and contact through children or extended family.
• Section 264(2)(c) — besetting or watching the dwelling-house, or place where the complainant or anyone known to them resides, works, carries on business, or happens to be.
• Section 264(2)(d) — engaging in threatening conduct directed at the complainant or at anyone or any animal known to them (conduct on or after July 18, 2026); for earlier conduct, directed at the complainant or any member of their family. Section 264(2)(d) does not require a verbal threat — conduct that is threatening in its effect is enough. And unlike paragraphs (a) and (b), paragraph (d) does not require the conduct to be repeated. The Ontario Court of Appeal held in R v Kosikar, 1999 CanLII 3775 (ONCA), at paragraphs 20 to 26, that a single threatening act can support a conviction where, in the circumstances, it causes the complainant to feel harassed in the Sillipp sense. Kosikar was decided under the former section; the single-incident structure of paragraph (d) is unchanged.

The conduct under each paragraph has its own threshold. "Repeated" communication can be made out with as few as two communications in the right circumstances. "Besetting or watching" requires more than incidental presence — courts have held that merely being near a location, without more, does not satisfy the section. The fact-specific reading of the contact and its context is the core of many criminal harassment defences.

What the Crown Must Prove — The Current Test and the Sillipp Test

Conduct on or after July 18, 2026. Under the current s. 264(1), the Crown must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that:

1. The accused engaged in conduct described in s. 264(2)(a), (a.1), (b), (c), or (d);
2. The accused did so without lawful authority;
3. The accused intended to harass the complainant, or knew that, or was reckless as to whether, the conduct would harass them; and
4. In all the circumstances, the conduct could reasonably be expected to cause the complainant to believe that their safety, or the safety of anyone known to them, was threatened — safety including psychological safety (s. 264(6)).

The complainant's actual fear is no longer an element, though how the complainant reacted remains evidence the court may consider. The section still uses the word "harass," which Sillipp defined at paragraph 16. Under the former section, the Crown also had to prove that the complainant was in fact harassed, because the accused had to know or be reckless about it. Whether that remains a separate requirement where the Crown proceeds on the new "intent to harass" route is an open question.

Conduct before July 18, 2026. The leading authority in Alberta on the elements of the former offence is the Alberta Court of Appeal's decision in R v Sillipp, 1997 ABCA 346. Leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada was refused. Sillipp sets out a five-part test, at paragraph 18, that the Crown must establish beyond a reasonable doubt:

1. The accused engaged in conduct described in the former s. 264(2)(a), (b), (c), or (d);
2. The complainant was harassed — meaning more than vexed, disquieted or annoyed (Sillipp, paragraph 16): in the words the Ontario Court of Appeal adopted in Kosikar at paragraphs 24 and 25, the complainant felt "tormented, troubled, worried continually or chronically, plagued, bedeviled and badgered";
3. The accused knew that the complainant was harassed, or was reckless or wilfully blind as to whether the complainant was harassed;
4. The conduct caused the complainant to fear for their safety or the safety of anyone known to them;
5. The complainant's fear was reasonable in all the circumstances.

Under either version, each element is distinct and each is independently litigable. The element most often misunderstood — by both accused persons and the popular discourse around stalking — is the mental element. Under the former section, the Crown did not need to prove that the accused intended to cause fear, but it did have to prove subjective knowledge that the complainant was harassed, or recklessness or wilful blindness about that fact. The Alberta Court of Appeal held expressly at paragraph 36 of Sillipp that an accused "who honestly believed that his sub-section (2) behaviour was not known to the complainant, and who was not reckless or wilfully blind, would escape criminal liability." The current section keeps the knowledge and recklessness routes, framed around whether the accused knew or was reckless as to whether the conduct would harass, and adds intent to harass as a third. Under both versions, an honest belief that the contact was welcome or that no harassment was occurring is incompatible with knowledge or recklessness. The belief need not be reasonable, but the less reasonable it is, the harder it is to accept as honest and the closer it comes to recklessness or wilful blindness.

The objective part of the test is not conducted in a vacuum under either version. The Court of Appeal in Sillipp, at paragraph 27, confirmed under the former section that the reasonable-person standard does not exclude the particular vulnerabilities of the complainant from consideration. The current section's "in all the circumstances" leaves room for the same approach: the context in which the conduct occurred is part of the analysis.

Charging Patterns, Bail, and the Section 264(4) Aggravating Factor

In Alberta, criminal harassment charges very frequently arise out of intimate partner relationships that have broken down, and frequently travel alongside companion charges under s. 264.1 (uttering threats), s. 145 (failure to comply with conditions of release), s. 423 (intimidation), and assault charges under ss. 265 to 268. Where the conduct involves an intimate partner or a former intimate partner, the file proceeds on the Crown's specialized domestic dockets — in Calgary, through Court 1B and the Domestic Violence and Family Violence Court Program — with elevated Crown screening and a presumption against early withdrawal.

The intimate-partner violence offence (s. 263.1). Since July 17, 2026, the Code has contained a stand-alone offence of committing any "included offence" in which violence is used, threatened or attempted against an intimate partner (s. 263.1, added by S.C. 2026, c. 12). From July 18, 2026, s. 3.01 deems criminal harassment to be such an offence. Harassment of an intimate partner on or after that date can therefore be charged under s. 263.1, with s. 264 as the included offence. On indictment the maximum rises from 10 years to 14 (s. 263.1(3)(c)), and the provisions that would apply to a s. 264 charge — procedure, orders and consequences — carry over (s. 263.1(4)). The higher ceiling also bears on whether a discharge is available (s. 730). Our domestic violence page explains s. 263.1 in more detail.

Bail. Criminal harassment has long carried a mandatory weapons condition on release unless the justice finds it is not required for anyone's safety (s. 515(4.1)). Since July 18, 2026, that rule reaches s. 264 through s. 3.01, which deems criminal harassment an offence "in the commission of which violence is used, threatened or attempted" for bail purposes; in practice the condition is unchanged. The real change is in intimate-partner files. The deeming means criminal harassment now counts as intimate-partner violence for the factor in s. 515(3)(a) and for the reverse onus in s. 515(6)(b.1). An accused charged with harassing an intimate partner must show why detention is not justified if they have a prior conviction or discharge for violence against any intimate partner — which now includes a prior criminal harassment of a partner — or if they were, at the time, bound by a peace bond under s. 810, 810.02, 810.03, 810.1 or 810.2 laid on behalf of any intimate partner. In a reverse-onus hearing the accused must clearly demonstrate that their proposed release plan addresses the risks (s. 515(6)). These bail provisions apply to cases already under way, whatever the date of the alleged conduct.

Section 264(4) is a feature of these files that commonly surprises accused persons. Where the criminal harassment is alleged to have occurred in breach of the terms of a court order — a s. 161 order, a peace bond or recognizance under s. 810, 810.03, 810.1 or 810.2, or a similar order, recognizance, or undertaking — the court must consider that breach as an aggravating factor on sentencing. Section 810.03 recognizances (fear of domestic violence) were added to the list on July 18, 2026, and Parliament directed that the change applies to cases already under way. The interaction of the criminal harassment charge and any preceding restraining order, peace bond, or release condition can substantially elevate the sentencing exposure and limits the negotiating space for resolution. Section 718.2(a)(ii) further requires the court to treat abuse of an intimate partner or family member as an aggravating circumstance, and s. 718.201 directs the court to consider the increased vulnerability of female victims of intimate partner abuse, with particular attention to Aboriginal female victims.

Coercive Control (Enacted, Not in Force) and Parallel Civil Exposure

Coercive control — patterns of psychological, financial, and behavioural control within an intimate relationship — is now the subject of a specific Criminal Code offence that Parliament has enacted but that is not yet in force. Section 264.01, added by the Protecting Victims Act (S.C. 2026, c. 19, s. 28), makes it an offence to engage in a pattern of coercive or controlling conduct toward an intimate partner, with intent to cause them to believe their safety is threatened, or knowing or being reckless as to whether it would. The pattern may be any combination, or repeated instances, of the listed acts: using or threatening violence against the partner, a child in their care, anyone known to them, or an animal known to them; coercing sexual activity; and other conduct — such as controlling or monitoring the partner's location, movements, social interactions, finances, employment, appearance or access to health care — that could reasonably be expected to cause the partner to believe that their safety, or the safety of anyone known to them, is threatened. It is a hybrid offence with a ten-year maximum on indictment. Section 264.01 comes into force on June 18, 2028, or on an earlier date fixed by order of the Governor in Council. It cannot apply to conduct that occurs before it comes into force.

Until then, conduct of that character continues to be prosecuted under existing offences, with s. 264 doing significant work alongside s. 264.1 (uttering threats), s. 279 (forcible confinement), and s. 423 (intimidation). Two changes already in force reach part of the same ground: the monitoring paragraph in s. 264(2)(a.1) and the intimate-partner violence offence in s. 263.1, both described above.

On the civil side, the Supreme Court of Canada's recent decision in Ahluwalia v Ahluwalia, 2026 SCC 16 recognized a new common-law tort of intimate partner violence — reversing the Court of Appeal for Ontario, which had declined to create it — and centred the new cause of action on coercive and controlling conduct that deprives a partner of autonomy, which can be shown by a pattern of abuse but also by a single act of violence, rather than on physical or psychological injury alone. For accused persons facing criminal harassment charges in a domestic context, this means the underlying conduct may give rise to parallel civil exposure separate from the criminal proceeding — including in circumstances where the criminal matter resolves by peace bond, withdrawal, or acquittal. The civil tort and the criminal offences are separate: the tort is not a criminal charge, and s. 264.01 is not yet in force.

Digital Evidence, Disclosure, and the Charter Framework

Modern criminal harassment files are built almost entirely on digital records. Text messages, email, social media direct messages, posts and comments visible to the complainant, call logs, metadata, account subscriber records, and IP-linked activity logs are the evidentiary backbone of nearly every modern s. 264 prosecution. The monitoring paragraph added in 2026 brings location data, app logs and account-access records into the same frame. The procedural framework governing how that evidence is obtained — and how it can be challenged — is substantial.

Production orders, subscriber information, and IP addresses. The Supreme Court of Canada held in R v Spencer, 2014 SCC 43, that there is a reasonable expectation of privacy in subscriber information that links an internet account to an identifiable individual. At paragraph 47, the Court held that "the identity of a person linked to their use of the Internet must be recognized as giving rise to a privacy interest beyond that inherent in the person's name, address and telephone number." Privacy in this context includes anonymity — the ability to engage online without being linked to that activity. The Supreme Court extended that framework in R v Bykovets, 2024 SCC 6, holding that an IP address itself — not only the subscriber information to which it can be linked — attracts a reasonable expectation of privacy under s. 8, so that a request by the state to a third party for an IP address is a search. After Bykovets, police cannot obtain a suspect's IP address on an informal request to a platform or payment processor; absent exigent circumstances, they need lawful authority, such as a production order. Neither the Criminal Code provision confirming that police may ask for voluntary disclosure (s. 487.014(1) when Spencer was decided, now s. 487.0195(1)) nor s. 7(3)(c.1)(ii) of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act creates any police search power (Spencer, paragraphs 71 and 73). In criminal harassment files where the identification of the accused depends on carrier records, platform records, or ISP records, the production order — or the authorization for the underlying IP address — is the gating event, and its validity is litigable.

Charter review of authorizations. Where the Crown has obtained communications evidence by way of an authorization or production order, the affidavit on which the authorization was granted is open to substantive review. On review, the question is not whether the reviewing judge would have granted it, but whether, on the record before the issuing justice or judge — with misleading information excised, and amplified only to correct good-faith errors — it could have issued (R v Garofoli, [1990] 2 SCR 1421; R v Morelli, 2010 SCC 8). But where the affidavit relies on confidential informer information or on contested factual assertions, the accused may apply for leave to cross-examine the affiant. Garofoli rejected the restrictive American standard from Franks v Delaware; leave should be granted where the accused shows a basis for the view that the cross-examination will elicit testimony tending to discredit one of the preconditions to the authorization. The threshold is not trivial, but it is meaningfully lower than the standard most accused persons assume applies.

The Defences That Actually Work

Criminal harassment files reward careful work on each element of the offence, under the version of s. 264 that applies to the conduct alleged. The questions that matter:

Which version of s. 264 applies. If any of the alleged conduct occurred before July 18, 2026, the former elements govern that conduct, including actual fear. Where the charge spans that date, how the Crown has framed it is itself a live issue (see above).

Absence of the prohibited conduct. Did the contact actually fall within the applicable paragraphs of s. 264(2)? Communications conducted through agreed channels (a lawyer, a parenting coordinator, a court-ordered communication tool), occasional or one-off contact that does not meet the "repeated" threshold under paragraphs (a) and (b), and presence in shared locations that does not amount to besetting or watching are all open to argument. Under the monitoring paragraph, location-sharing or account access that both people set up during the relationship, or that is authorized by a parenting arrangement, raises questions about lawful authority and the mental element. The single-incident reach of paragraph (d) is real, but it is bounded — the conduct must still be threatening in its effect, and must still meet the rest of the applicable test.

Absence of mens rea. For earlier conduct, the Crown must prove that the accused knew the complainant was harassed, or was reckless or wilfully blind. For conduct on or after July 18, 2026, it must prove intent to harass, or knowledge or recklessness as to whether the conduct would harass. Under either version, an honest belief that contact was welcome is incompatible with knowledge or recklessness (Sillipp, paragraph 36). The prior conduct of the relationship, the complainant's own messages, or the absence of any communication indicating distress can support that belief. The contemporaneous record of the relationship can do substantial work here.

The objective threshold. For conduct on or after July 18, 2026, the question is whether, in all the circumstances, the conduct could reasonably be expected to cause the complainant to believe that their safety, or the safety of someone known to them, was threatened. The complainant's actual reaction is no longer the test, but the threshold remains a real one: the conduct must be capable of supporting a reasonable belief that safety — including psychological safety — is threatened, not merely of causing annoyance, upset or offence. For earlier conduct, the Crown must prove both that the complainant actually feared for their safety and that the fear was reasonable. Under either version, the complainant's particular vulnerabilities are part of the analysis, but they do not displace the objective standard.

Identification. Where the alleged contact occurred through digital channels — text messages, social media, anonymous communications — the identification of the accused as the actual sender is not always straightforward. Spoofing, shared accounts, hacked accounts, contested authorship of online communications, and the Spencer and Bykovets framework on subscriber and IP records all give defence counsel real ground to work.

Charter defences. Statements taken in breach of the right to counsel under s. 10(b), warrantless seizures of phones or social-media records, and production orders for communications data based on insufficient grounds each engage Charter analysis. Garofoli and Morelli set the test for reviewing an authorization or production order, and Garofoli the threshold for cross-examining the affiant; Spencer and Bykovets govern the production of subscriber and account information and the reasonable expectation of privacy in IP addresses and IP-linked online activity. Where Charter breaches are made out, exclusion under s. 24(2) is a live question, though not an automatic one — the Court's analysis in Spencer itself, where the breach was found but the evidence was nonetheless admitted, is a reminder that the exclusion analysis is fact-specific.

Counter-narrative on the relationship. Criminal harassment files in the domestic context frequently involve a partial picture — the complainant's account, screenshots selected by the complainant, and a narrative shaped by the family law dispute that often runs alongside. The complete contemporaneous record — both sides of the conversation, messages from the complainant to the accused, prior history of the relationship — can shift the picture considerably. Disclosure work is where much of the defence is done.

Sentencing and Collateral Consequences

Criminal harassment is a hybrid offence. The Crown elects between summary conviction (maximum two years less a day) and indictment (maximum ten years). Where harassment of an intimate partner on or after July 18, 2026 is charged under s. 263.1, the indictable maximum is 14 years. The election typically reflects the seriousness of the conduct, the relationship between the accused and the complainant, the history of prior orders or contacts, and the breach of any standing court orders. The sentencing range covers absolute and conditional discharges in the lowest-end files through to multi-year custodial sentences in serious or repeat-offender files.

Conditional sentences served in the community are available for criminal harassment following the 2022 amendments under Bill C-5, which repealed, among others, the former bar on criminal harassment prosecuted by indictment (former s. 742.1(f)(ii)) and the bar on indictable offences with a 10-year maximum that involved bodily harm, drugs or a weapon. Eligibility remains subject to the court being satisfied that service of the sentence in the community would not endanger public safety. The 2026 amendments did not add s. 264 to the offences barred from a conditional sentence. There is one narrow exception: for offences committed on or after July 15, 2026, s. 742.1(c.2) bars a conditional sentence for an offence prosecuted by indictment that is of a sexual nature, or committed for a sexual purpose, and involves a victim under 18 — which could capture a criminal harassment prosecution of that kind. Suspended sentences with strict probation conditions — including no-contact terms, no-attendance terms, counselling, and weapons prohibitions — are a common resolution. Section 810 peace bonds are sometimes available as an early-resolution path in appropriate files.

Beyond the sentence itself, a criminal harassment conviction carries consequences that fall into two distinct groups: orders the sentencing court can impose as part of the sentence, and consequences that follow from the conviction but are imposed by other decision-makers under separate regimes.

Orders the court can impose as part of the sentence. These are ancillary orders, each with its own statutory test, and each open to submissions at sentencing:

• Firearms prohibition. Criminal harassment is one of the offences for which a weapons prohibition is mandatory. Section 109(1)(b) of the Criminal Code — as amended in 2023 — expressly names s. 264, so a conviction (or a discharge, where one is available) for criminal harassment triggers a mandatory prohibition order whether the Crown proceeds summarily or by indictment. A replacement version of s. 109(1)(b), enacted in 2026 but not yet in force, keeps s. 264 and adds the coercive control offence. On a first offence the order runs for at least ten years on ordinary firearms, ammunition, crossbows, and explosive substances, and for life on prohibited and restricted firearms and prohibited weapons, devices, and ammunition (s. 109(2)); a subsequent offence carries a lifetime prohibition on everything (s. 109(3)).
• Post-sentence no-contact order (s. 729.2). For offences committed on or after July 18, 2026, the court that sentences an offender for criminal harassment — or grants a conditional discharge with probation — may prohibit contact, including communication by any means, with any victim, witness or other person named in the order. The order may run for life or any shorter period, so it can outlast the sentence itself; breaching it is a separate offence. Where the conduct spans July 18, whether this order is available raises the same open question described above.
• Other no-contact and protection orders. Probation orders, recognizances, and standalone restraining orders frequently impose terms that follow the offender for years after the sentence has been served.
• DNA order. Criminal harassment is a secondary designated offence, so on application by the Crown the court may order a DNA sample under s. 487.051(3) of the Criminal Code where it is in the best interests of the administration of justice. Registration under the Sex Offender Information Registration Act does not arise on an ordinary criminal harassment file — s. 264 is only a secondary SOIRA offence, which engages solely where the Crown proves the offence was committed with the intent to commit a listed sexual offence.

Consequences the conviction can trigger elsewhere. These are not imposed by the criminal court and are not part of the sentence; they flow from the fact of the conviction or record under other regimes:

• Family law interaction. A criminal harassment conviction can be referenced in concurrent family law proceedings — particularly in custody, parenting time, and contact disputes — and may affect outcomes there. The Supreme Court of Canada's recognition of a tort of intimate partner violence in Ahluwalia v Ahluwalia opens an additional civil avenue that may run in parallel with the criminal file.
• Employment and professional licensing. A criminal record can affect employment in regulated professions, the public sector, and any role requiring a vulnerable sector check. Healthcare, education, law, finance, and trades are all affected.
• Immigration consequences. For non-citizens, a criminal harassment conviction triggers inadmissibility analysis under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Because criminal harassment carries a 10-year maximum, a conviction is "serious criminality" for a permanent resident or foreign national whether the Crown proceeded summarily or by indictment (IRPA ss. 36(1)(a), 36(3)(a)); the length of any custodial sentence matters to whether a removal order can be appealed (s. 64).
• Travel. U.S. travel can also be affected.

Where We Appear

We act on criminal harassment files in the Alberta Court of Justice, the Court of King's Bench of Alberta, and the Court of Appeal of Alberta, and on related peace bond and protection order matters. From our Calgary office we travel to court in Airdrie, Cochrane, Canmore, Okotoks, Diamond Valley, Didsbury, Strathmore, Drumheller, Hanna, Brooks, Medicine Hat, Lethbridge, Fort Macleod, Taber, Pincher Creek, and Cardston, and we appear in matters arising on the Tsuut'ina, Siksika, and Kainai (Blood Tribe) Nations.

If You Have Been Charged or Contacted by Police, Call a Lawyer Today.

Criminal harassment files often arise during difficult relationship transitions, when the temptation to explain everything to police is greatest. The decisions made in the first 24 hours — whether to provide a statement, whether to surrender devices, what to say to family or to the complainant — shape the file for months. The initial consultation is at no charge and is conducted in strict confidence.