Une erreur quant à l’application du droit civil peut donner ouverture à la défense d’apparence de droit

R. v. Hudson, 2014 BCCA 87

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[24]        As succinctly stated by Madam Justice Levine in R. v. Manuel, 2008 BCCA 143 at para. 10, 231 C.C.C. (3d) 468, leave to appeal ref’d [2008] 2 S.C.R. x, the defence of colour of right is based on “an honest belief in a state of facts or civil law which, if it existed, would negate the mens rea for the offence”.  In R. v. Dorosh, 2003 SKCA 134, 183 C.C.C. (3d) 224, Chief Justice Bayda described this defence in the following terms:

[18]      A colour of right can have its basis in either a mistake of civil law (a colour of right provides an exception to s. 19 of the Code; see:  The Law of Theft and Related Offences [by Winifred H. Holland (Toronto: Carswell, 1998)] p. 153) or in a mistake in a state of facts.  The mistake in each case must give rise to either an honest belief in a proprietary or possessory right to the thing which is the subject matter of the alleged theft or an honest belief in the state of facts which if it actually existed would at law justify or excuse the act done.