Can A Victim Consent To Assault Causing Bodily Harm?
You’ve been charged with assault causing bodily harm. The victim had stitches or a broken arm, or something like that, a broken nose. Pretty serious charge. Now you come to our firm and retain us and say “look they consented to the fight. We were at a bar and he and I agreed to step outside we got in a fight. I won the fight and caused these injuries. Why are they proceeding with the charge because the victim consented?” Well, you can consent to a simple assault where there’s no injuries. So you and I and anyone else can step outside and have a fight and as long as there’s no injuries then there’s going to be no charges.The problem is in Canada, there is a line of cases right from the Supreme Court of Canada, you cannot consent to bodily harm. So if we step outside and get in a fight and I injure you resulting in bodily harm I’m going to get charged and that’s not a defence. The defence, if there’s self-defence you can defend yourself but you can’t agree to get into a fight cause bodily harm and think you are going to get away with it. So that’s the simple answer to that particular question.
