{"id":10240,"date":"2015-03-10T09:39:09","date_gmt":"2015-03-10T09:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:81\/wordpress\/?p=10240"},"modified":"2015-03-10T09:39:09","modified_gmt":"2015-03-10T09:39:09","slug":"amendment-makes-assault-on-a-ttc-driver-an-aggravating-circumstance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/amendment-makes-assault-on-a-ttc-driver-an-aggravating-circumstance\/","title":{"rendered":"Amendment makes assault on a TTC driver an &#8216;aggravating circumstance&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"postContent post-content\">\n<div>\n<p>When a court deems that a criminal offence was committed under &#8220;aggravating circumstances,&#8221; sentencing may be increased. Examples of aggravating circumstances recognized by Canadian courts include the following:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Evidence that the defendant abused someone younger than 18<\/li>\n<li>Evidence that there was a relationship of trust or authority between the defendant and the victim<\/li>\n<li>Evidence that an assault or other criminal offence was motivated by prejudice or hate<\/li>\n<li>Evidence that the defendant abused his or her spouse<\/li>\n<li>Evidence that the defendant committed a terrorism offence<\/li>\n<li class=\"last-child\">Evidence that the offence benefited or was otherwise linked to a criminal organization<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>A recent amendment to the Canadian Criminal Code adds a new aggravating circumstance: assault of a public transit operator.<\/p>\n<p>According to Senator Bob Runciman, who\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.thestar.com\/news\/gta\/2015\/02\/17\/assault-against-public-transit-workers-could-lead-to-harsh-sentencing.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">introduced the bill<\/a>, each year in Canada roughly 2,000 public transit operators are assaulted. The president of the union that represents Toronto Transit Commission workers stated that assaults on TTC drivers happen at a rate of about four a week.<\/p>\n<p>The amendment specifies that a &#8220;public transit worker&#8221; is a person who drives a bus, train or taxi cab to transport the public. The new bill does not specify that assault on a transit collector is necessarily an aggravating circumstance, though the union president suggested that his organization would seek to have the legislation amended to cover all transit workers.<\/p>\n<p>Assault charges can lead to very serious consequences, including prison sentences, fines and court-ordered treatment. If you have been accused of assault, then it is crucial that you speak with a criminal defence lawyer as soon as possible. A defence lawyer can\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/Violent-Offences\/index.html\">investigate your case<\/a>, scrutinize the evidence against you, gather defence evidence, prepare you for court, and develop a legal strategy for protecting your rights and freedom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When a court deems that a criminal offence was committed under &#8220;aggravating circumstances,&#8221; sentencing may be increased. Examples of aggravating circumstances recognized by Canadian courts include the following: Evidence that the defendant abused someone younger than 18 Evidence that there was a relationship of trust or authority between the defendant and the victim Evidence that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[70,43,24],"class_list":["post-10240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-violent-crimes","tag-assault","tag-criminal-defence","tag-violent-crimes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nrlawyers.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}