Western Standard - Would you spend $2,500 to FIGHT a $75 ticket？

00:00:00.000 I asked a dozen times, and they refused to give me a trial, which I'm pretty sure is illegal, isn't it?

00:00:07.700 So, in this case, everybody's entitled to their day in court, okay?

00:00:12.160 I was not. We had to hire you, pro bono, but I hired you to get me a trial.

00:00:19.280 They refused to even give a trial for a simple parking ticket.

00:00:22.400 So, very few people fight these things, but the reality is there is an established rules of process,

00:00:27.580 even for procedural offenses it actually is they didn't follow those they didn't follow those at

00:00:32.340 all so we actually had to go and complain numerous times I've got all the email straight string here

00:00:38.060 where I had to simply simply bat my head against a wall a few times bang it rather and eventually

00:00:44.380 they relented and gave you a trial date but it's interesting eventually they dropped the

00:00:49.100 entire ticket seeing how ludicrous it was

00:00:51.380 everyone's had a ticket before speeding parking dogs something like that

00:01:21.380 But you've also, at some point, probably had a ticket that was false, that was not deserved, 0.97

00:01:26.780 that was total bullshit written up by some municipal officer with a chip on their shoulder. 0.86

00:01:33.260 But what do you do if you're literally not allowed to fight it? 0.99

00:01:38.220 Or if the cost of fighting it is far more than the ticket's actually worth?

00:01:42.120 Well, that happened to me a bit over a year ago when I was moving.

00:01:45.580 I had parked my truck and towing a trailer in front of my old house,

00:01:49.700 I was just loading up the very last few items before taking them to my new house.

00:01:54.400 And the tires on my, one of the tires on my truck had blown out.

00:02:00.220 I couldn't move it.

00:02:01.640 I had my truck towed, and the very next morning came back with another truck and moved the trailer away.

00:02:08.580 But some city of Calgary official had given me a parking ticket for parking in front of my own house for just a few hours. 0.99

00:02:15.320 i tried to appeal this but they literally wouldn't let me so naturally i lost my shit and went 0.94

00:02:22.960 nuclear and hired a lawyer former minister of justice and attorney general of alberta 0.60

00:02:28.800 jonathan dennis who joins me today hi derrick um this is actually the second time i've worked

00:02:35.980 with you to go to totally nuclear on the city of calgary we'll talk about the other one in a little

00:02:39.900 bit. But yeah, long story short, it was just a regular trailer. I left out in front of a house,

00:02:46.520 my old house, moving the last items out. And yeah, the tire was blown on a truck. You literally

00:02:52.800 cannot move it. Had it towed away. And came back the next morning with a truck, a friend's truck,

00:02:58.800 to move my trailer. And I was left a ticket. I appealed it. And they said, no, they just

00:03:04.780 literally would not respond. They would not allow me to go to a trial and be like, yeah,

00:03:09.360 Here's the circumstances. 0.65

00:03:10.440 This is obviously a silly little ticket.

00:03:13.360 It's 75. 0.52

00:03:14.360 It was a $75 ticket.

00:03:16.440 Most of the time, I just pay a ticket because I'm at least a little bit guilty.

00:03:20.140 A little bit.

00:03:20.920 In this case, I was zero.

00:03:22.780 And so I called you up.

00:03:26.140 So all I want to talk about is access to justice on minor things.

00:03:29.920 You know, if you kill someone and you don't have money for a lawyer, you get assigned, probably not a great lawyer, but you're going to get assigned a lawyer.

00:03:35.460 Legal aid is there for that purpose?

00:03:36.980 Yeah.

00:03:37.160 Yeah, there's no legal aid when some dipshit city official gives you a ticket for parking a trailer in front of your own house for a few hours and you had a blown tire or something like that.

00:03:51.220 So why don't you just real briefly, going to just sum up what it is we had to do to beat a $75 parking ticket.

00:03:59.420 So first of all, I just want to confirm because you're my client, I'm here talking with your consent that I can talk about this matter.

00:04:04.620 Talk about anything.

00:04:05.460 Thank you.

00:04:06.140 So what happened, this was your buddy's trailer.

00:04:08.440 So your buddy's truck, rather.

00:04:09.780 So he goes and pays the ticket, but he paid it under protest.

00:04:13.500 So what I had to do is I then had to contact the prosecutor's office.

00:04:18.160 They were a bit confused.

00:04:19.420 And I had to go through a whole process here.

00:04:21.600 And I want to quote from something that they sent to me in June 18th of this year.

00:04:25.500 I asked to appear in person.

00:04:26.740 They said, no, you cannot appear in person.

00:04:28.880 Please do not contact us again on this matter, as we'll contact you with the date.

00:04:33.720 A little rude, but I'll let that slide.

00:04:35.320 The issue is that this is a very complex process, even for tickets.

00:04:39.000 You have to go and get the disclosure.

00:04:40.740 So under a case called Stinchcomb, you have to get disclosure

00:04:43.520 so that the prosecutor has to show what the Crown has against you. 0.72

00:04:47.900 In this particular case, it was absolutely ridiculous.

00:04:52.380 You literally could not move your trailer.

00:04:55.160 I'm going to suggest to you that probably one of your neighbours called the city

00:04:59.020 and finked on you here, complained about it, didn't like your trailer there,

00:05:02.540 and then somebody comes out and gives you a $75 ticket.

00:05:05.320 Here's the real question here.

00:05:06.980 Yes, $75 is $75, but you've got a buddy who's a lawyer.

00:05:11.200 You make a decent living.

00:05:12.760 What about the person who makes $40,000 a year?

00:05:14.600 Guess what happens?

00:05:15.660 They simply have to pay.

00:05:17.660 And $75, you know, for some people at the margins, that's going to be a lot.

00:05:21.240 It is.

00:05:21.600 And here's what happens is if you don't pay a ticket like that,

00:05:24.800 then if you don't respond a certain time, they will convict you in your absence.

00:05:28.900 You will get a late payment surcharge.

00:05:30.560 And get this, the next time you go register your vehicle,

00:05:33.060 you've got to pay it or you can't register it.

00:05:34.620 Well, that's actually what happened in a sense, because it wasn't my trailer.

00:05:37.360 It was a friend's trailer, and he ended up paying it because after nearly a year went by,

00:05:41.980 he needed to register his own vehicle or something, and the trailer's under his name,

00:05:45.320 so he had no choice but to pay it.

00:05:47.200 But I had filed roughly a dozen requests to be allowed to fight.

00:05:52.880 I wasn't going to hire a lawyer right away.

00:05:54.240 I was just going to go in and be like, yeah, Your Honour, here's the ticket.

00:05:59.100 So here's the receipt of the tow truck.

00:06:01.240 I obviously had no vehicle, and here's the circumstances.

00:06:04.100 Throw it away.

00:06:05.440 I asked a dozen times, and they refused to give me a trial, which I'm pretty sure is illegal, isn't it?

00:06:12.740 So, in this case, everybody's entitled to their day in court, okay?

00:06:17.180 I was not. We had to hire you, pro bono, but I hired you to get me a trial.

00:06:24.320 They refused to even give a trial for a simple parking ticket.

00:06:27.420 So, very few people fight these things, but the reality is there is an established rules of process,

00:06:32.620 even for procedural offenses it actually is but they didn't follow those they didn't follow those

00:06:37.280 at all so we actually had to go and complain numerous times i've got all the email straight

00:06:42.560 string here where i had to simply simply uh bat uh bat my head against a wall a few times bang it

00:06:47.860 rather and eventually they relented and gave you a trial date but it's interesting eventually they

00:06:53.560 dropped the entire ticket seeing how ludicrous it was now 99 of people won't do this they'll get

00:06:59.360 frustrated with the process, they'll say, ah, forget it. Here's the 75 bucks. How often is

00:07:04.120 this happening is the question I ask. So I think it's happening a lot more than some people might

00:07:10.560 think, uh, because as I said, this is actually the second time I've, uh, lawyered up with you

00:07:16.400 to nuke the city of Calgary for a ridiculous ticket. Uh, a few years ago, it was a fairly

00:07:22.980 warm spring day um i had taken my family out to uh banff for a birthday dinner for uh an extended

00:07:30.280 relative and we came back and i found something at my house it was not technically a ticket it

00:07:35.280 was an invoice it was for ice removal on a sidewalk i remember this yeah there was no here i'm gonna

00:07:41.900 okay i'll put the picture up in a second but uh they said they left me an invoice to send

00:07:48.640 contractors to my house to remove ice from the sidewalk i'm meticulous about keeping my sidewalk

00:07:53.760 clean at least when i used to live in the city i'm not there anymore but um uh there was nothing to

00:07:59.600 do i was like oh this is odd and i and i opened up this invoice and it had a picture of the before

00:08:06.080 and the after i remember the ice bubble let's put them up on the screen

00:08:11.680 corporate needs you to tell the difference between these two photos

00:08:15.280 if any of you could successfully guess with any confidence which one was before and which one was

00:08:21.100 after you know uh well we got a prize for you uh they did absolutely nothing it was a it was a

00:08:29.280 grift uh these guys made money to do absolutely nothing and um but that's what the city did is

00:08:36.060 they issued an invoice rather than a ticket because a ticket technically you can appeal

00:08:40.440 an invoice well that's just a bill you have to pay and I remember I called up the city of

00:08:45.960 Calgary and I said this is ridiculous blah blah blah and they're like no you have to pay it I said

00:08:49.260 let me just you know I'm going to email you the before and after pictures and if you can guess

00:08:55.260 which one's before and which one's after you got a 50 50 chance but if you can guess the right one

00:08:59.680 I'll drop the whole thing I sent it to them and they're like doesn't matter sir you got to pay

00:09:05.040 your ticket blah blah blah blah blah i'm like all right so i called up my buddy johnno and

00:09:11.240 and we we nuked them and then they they eventually called and they apologized

00:09:15.740 they dropped it eventually themselves but we we actually wanted to take them to court at that 0.99

00:09:21.280 point i think uh to have a little discipline put on the city officials that do this kind of stupid 1.00

00:09:27.660 thing. But then again, they also, they did not go to a trial once I brought you in, because I think 0.94

00:09:35.260 they realize people working for the city of Calgary are going to lose their jobs when a judge

00:09:40.360 chews them out for this kind of thing. The issue is, though, is that if you go to court, you have

00:09:45.040 to hire a lawyer. You're not going to, at this level of court, you don't get any court costs.

00:09:48.760 For what I did for you here, I'd probably bill you about $2,500. $2,500 would be a $75 ticket.

00:09:54.680 Okay, so there's a major access to justice here.

00:09:57.140 I do think that there's room for improvement at all levels of government.

00:10:00.200 I'm not against fines.

00:10:01.240 You need to have fines as an incentive to deter negative behavior,

00:10:05.920 but you've got to be reasonable about it.

00:10:07.620 Come on.

00:10:08.840 Yeah, well, it was a $75 ticket here.

00:10:11.580 It was, what, about $2,500 to beat in court.

00:10:14.560 The so-called ice removal one where you fought there,

00:10:19.560 that one we actually had to go to Court of Queen's bench,

00:10:23.340 like an appellate court, essentially.

00:10:24.680 to be allowed to have this overturned because there literally was no court process.

00:10:30.660 So in one case, you had to go to an appellate court because there's no court process.

00:10:34.380 And the other one, for this parking ticket, there is a court process,

00:10:37.620 but the city of Calgary didn't follow its own court process.

00:10:40.720 It refused to give us a date.

00:10:43.500 A lot of matters are overturned on the basis of procedural fairness.

00:10:47.300 Guess what?

00:10:47.900 We have an appellate process because judges make mistakes.

00:10:51.100 They're human like anybody else.

00:10:52.240 I find often you have a closer eye when you get to the Court of Appeal, which is Alberta's top court.

00:10:58.040 But at the same time, who's really going to fight it that much?

00:11:01.000 They have the arm of the state, and I think that there's a responsibility from them to be reasonable to citizens here.

00:11:07.900 Well, that's the thing. I have no problem with there being fines if you don't clear the ice off your sidewalk,

00:11:13.580 if you park a trailer for a prolonged period of time on a public road.

00:11:19.500 But obviously on these two cases, these are way overboard. 0.83

00:11:24.100 But in both cases, you've got some busybodies at the city of Calgary issuing tickets that are completely ridiculous.

00:11:30.560 And then once called on it, refuse to budge at all, refuse to, in one case, give a trial date to beat that $75 parking ticket.

00:11:39.080 Or in the other case, allow there to even, they just call it an invoice so they don't have to have a process at all.

00:11:44.880 They don't do anything until they get a call from the former attorney general and they're shitting their pants all of a sudden.

00:11:52.280 Is there a way to fix this kind of thing? 1.00

00:11:55.760 Or is it just we have to just accept that there's stupid people working in every job, including in government, and that this is just the cost of having a government? 0.99

00:12:04.260 Insert Ronald Reagan quotes about government. 0.99

00:12:06.260 There's a certain truth to a lot of them.

00:12:07.540 But I will just say this, is that I would like, actually, if we could define in your case how much the government actually spent in resources going after a $75 ticket here.

00:12:18.820 I suggest you probably add a couple zeros to that when you look at all of the human power and the time, the wages of the people throughout the whole process we had to go through here.

00:12:27.520 Well, it would have been more if they actually would have actually gone to a trial.

00:12:30.360 We would have then had judges and a prosecutor over a $75 ticket, which they ultimately would have lost anyway.

00:12:36.420 Which they would have lost. Now, the process is there for a reason of public policy, but as a taxpayer, stuff like this should be concerning to you.

00:12:44.600 Yeah. But is there a way to, I doubt you could completely eliminate having a meter made with a chip on their shoulder.

00:12:53.540 You can't eliminate that. But is there any ways to mitigate this? Because, as we've said, $75 to me, I normally just pay it.

00:13:02.980 But this one just really particularly pissed me off, you know, so we nuked them because we wanted to make a point.

00:13:11.240 That's why. We wouldn't have done this just to not pay $75.

00:13:15.800 We did this to make a point and to kind of send a message to the city of Calgary so that we could talk about it here.

00:13:22.800 Is there any practical measures that could be taken to at least limit how often this kind of thing takes place?

00:13:30.380 I think that this is something that should be discussed at an executive level with city council, and I guarantee you that you're not the only person who has been through this.

00:13:40.040 This is something that our elected officials perhaps should look at.

00:13:43.500 Is it in the public interest to be proceeding like this?

00:13:46.020 Is it the interest of law enforcement?

00:13:47.560 Is it in the interest of the taxpayer?

00:13:49.220 That's what I'd be asking the elected official. 0.99

00:13:52.080 You know, I know maybe it's a bit of a trope, but, you know, they'll give you a $75 ticket for a bullshit thing. 0.94

00:13:58.920 now was the meter made there to know the reasons why the trailer was there no but they refused to 0.89

00:14:04.580 even listen or even allow a trial on it or you know ice clearing which was clearly they knew

00:14:11.660 that they were grifting when they did that you see these kind of things handed out all the time

00:14:17.400 to law-abiding people that they know are going to just pay but if I walk 20 meters that direction

00:14:25.320 I'm going to find a meth head out screaming at people.

00:14:28.640 I was at the A&W right across the LRT line here yesterday getting lunch,

00:14:33.940 and there was a meth head in there just screaming and demanding free food, 0.98

00:14:37.820 wanting to use the bathroom.

00:14:39.020 This is 7th Avenue. You're going to see that here.

00:14:40.780 Yeah. I've never seen a ticket handed out to one of these guys. Ever.

00:14:45.620 Like, nothing is done about them unless they're being physically violent.

00:14:49.800 If they're beating up a random woman on the streets, the police will intervene.

00:14:54.400 They'll probably charge them.

00:14:55.780 That person will never show up in court and they'll do nothing to execute a warrant to get them to court.

00:14:59.840 But they'll at least remove the person from the situation.

00:15:02.960 But nothing is done about that kind of thing, which is very obvious.

00:15:05.960 We know where they are.

00:15:06.900 We know who they are.

00:15:08.200 We know what they're doing.

00:15:09.180 They're there at all hours doing it.

00:15:11.420 Nothing's done about that stuff.

00:15:13.080 But they'll slap law-abiding citizens with tickets for absolutely nothing.

00:15:19.620 So my thoughts on that is just to be cognizant that politicians don't direct the police on an individual basis.

00:15:26.840 No, but I'm talking about law enforcement.

00:15:28.160 Why is law enforcement not enforcing the law?

00:15:31.780 I'd ask the chief of police.

00:15:32.920 I knew her when I was attorney general and she was the superintendent.

00:15:36.480 Her name's Katie McClellan.

00:15:37.380 She's quite a competent woman. 0.99

00:15:38.760 Go and ask her that.

00:15:39.720 That's something to ask the police why they're not cracking down on things that actually cause harm to people.

00:15:46.200 Well, what do you think, though, it is that, like, what's your opinion on why very obvious crimes and socially destructive behavior that is taking place 24 hours a day in very predictable places?

00:15:58.020 We know exactly where and when they are.

00:16:00.720 Nothing takes place about that.

00:16:03.100 Yet we're still devoting.

00:16:05.320 Now, they're not police aren't issuing, you know, a ticket for a trailer or an invoice for ice clearing.

00:16:11.220 But it is still public law enforcement resources.

00:16:13.960 It's just a different part of law enforcement.

00:16:15.400 why do you think it is we have these over overzealous application of the law in some areas

00:16:21.560 towards people they know pay their taxes obey the law will pay a fine will show up in court if they

00:16:26.720 have to and then absolutely nothing over here so this is a good question but i'm going to dial you

00:16:31.760 back as to what probably happened with with the vehicle outside of your former place it clearly

00:16:36.680 you lived in a suburban area of the city on the west end crestmont if i was correct okay so what

00:16:42.580 happened there is the cops aren't usually there that often. There aren't a lot of reasons for the

00:16:47.400 cops to be there or a bylaw and officer. I suggest to you that one of your neighbors call the city.

00:16:51.760 So, but the question that I would ask you is as a society, what are our priorities? And what's

00:16:57.760 very interesting to me is I spoke to a client of mine who's a recent immigrant from Ukraine.

00:17:02.060 And I said, what do you think of Canada? What do you think of Calgary? He says,

00:17:04.660 the biggest thing I have is that there's too many people openly using drugs and causing problems.

00:17:09.460 He said in Ukraine, that would be dealt with.

00:17:11.760 And I just, I took a step back from someone who is from a different country, what his comparative was.

00:17:18.700 I was in Ukraine just a few weeks ago.

00:17:21.460 And even though it was at war, now I was nowhere near the front lines, but, you know, I was in Kiev.

00:17:26.580 Well, Kiev was being, you know, there were ballistic missiles coming in.

00:17:29.080 I was in a part of the city that tends not to get hit because it's got embassies and whatnot.

00:17:33.240 It's more sensitive.

00:17:34.120 The Russians tend not to hit that.

00:17:35.220 But, you know, I was in Kiev, which had, you know, there'd be air raid sirens going off and I could see, you know, buildings burning in the distance from ballistic missiles.

00:17:47.500 I still felt safer there than in downtown Calgary at night.

00:17:52.420 In Kiev, you will see very attractive young women walking around by themselves at 3 a.m. 0.96

00:18:00.020 with no fear that, you know, maybe a missile gets them,

00:18:06.620 but they seem to be walking around with a greater sense of security and safety

00:18:10.380 in Kiev at 3 a.m. than in Calgary.

00:18:13.960 Like, you know, if you're a pretty young woman,

00:18:16.200 you do not walk around by yourself at 3 a.m. in the city anymore, at least.

00:18:19.880 Well, I'll say this to you.

00:18:21.260 Like you, I'm an immigrant from another province.

00:18:23.180 I moved here 26 years ago.

00:18:24.760 My first place that I purchased was in downtown Calgary.

00:18:27.980 The safety, and particularly the drug problem,

00:18:31.080 and you mentioned on 7th Avenue where there's no traffic.

00:18:33.860 My office is also on 7th Avenue.

00:18:35.660 It's way worse than when I moved here.

00:18:37.460 You see people using hard drugs in open premises,

00:18:42.500 the problems that you mentioned that that causes.

00:18:45.580 That is something I think that's a more legitimate public policy

00:18:48.220 to try to address through recovery, but also through law enforcement,

00:18:51.760 than somebody's parking ticket like that. 0.59

00:18:53.680 Alternatively, we could just conscript meth heads

00:18:56.600 and send them to the front line okay now derek okay okay okay i'll just leave it i have a suspicion

00:19:02.680 they actually do that in ukraine i don't think they have nearly the drug problem we do but my

00:19:07.000 suspicion is if someone is just like methed out being socially disruptive on the streets they're

00:19:11.740 like okay you're gonna go fight the russians okay buddy okay listen i'm gonna leave you with

00:19:16.180 comments like that okay all right uh anything else you want well you know you know something

00:19:21.440 my dad came to visit me this morning and he's got one of these oh so i'm gonna go and help him

00:19:25.540 He says, well, I don't want to bother you.

00:19:27.420 I said, nope, you're my dad.

00:19:28.460 Every now and then you've got to go and deal with something. 0.99

00:19:30.860 If you're helping me with these bullshit tickets, then I suppose you should help your dad too. 0.97

00:19:34.920 I appreciate it. 0.98

00:19:36.960 I think this thing is just happening a lot more than people imagine.

00:19:40.080 And it's not just happening to you.

00:19:43.880 It's happening to a lot of people.

00:19:47.620 And I'm just not really sure why.

00:19:50.040 Well, you know something?

00:19:52.080 If you go and Google Ronald Reagan quotes about government,

00:19:55.540 There's a few there that are somewhat true, and these quotes simply still go forward.

00:20:00.500 I'm not against these fines in principle, because they have to be there to deter negative behavior.

00:20:04.560 I want public order.

00:20:06.200 I want people to generally follow the rules.

00:20:09.180 You know, if you won't shovel, if you won't get the ice off your sidewalk, that's a problem.

00:20:14.140 If you're going to park destructively and leave a trailer for a week in front of someone else's house, especially.

00:20:19.600 But, you know, like, there is a place for this stuff.

00:20:21.520 I'm not saying we can get rid of these rules.

00:20:23.020 But following the rules goes both ways.

00:20:24.620 Our elected officials, our law enforcement officials also have to follow the rules.

00:20:28.860 But in both these cases, they literally wouldn't even allow a trial to determine if it was appropriate or not.

00:20:34.020 And the problem that I have is what does the person do who doesn't have a buddy who's a lawyer who's willing to push this a little bit?

00:20:40.680 You simply have to pay it.

00:20:41.920 That's wrong.

00:20:42.700 That's the problem right there.

00:20:44.400 All right, Jonathan.

00:20:45.640 Great seeing you as always.

00:20:46.640 Thank you, and thanks for getting me off the hook on this big charge.

00:20:49.580 Oh, yes.

00:20:50.440 My pleasure.

00:20:51.240 All right.

00:20:54.620 Thank you.

Western Standard - September 22, 2026

Would you spend $2,500 to FIGHT a $75 ticket？

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