The next father killed in his own home deserves better than a lecture about compliance

Canada likes to call itself safe and civilized, but when it comes to self-defense inside your own home, the deeply flawed criminal justice system reveals a twisted set of priorities. Recent headlines in Lindsay, Markham, and Toronto expose a disturbing reality. A homeowner can wake up to an armed intruder in his living room, fight for his life, and end up facing criminal charges. Meanwhile, police chiefs tell families to “Hide and comply” while a father of four is gunned down in front of his children. If that is public safety, then we have redefined the word into cowardice.

We are not talking about vigilantes roaming the street, or someone pulling a shotgun on a trespasser in the backyard. We are talking about the most sacred place a person has: their home. When an intruder crosses that threshold against your will, there can be no limitations on the homeowner. At that point, survival is not a theory, it is a split-second reaction. Yet, in Canada, the law burdens the homeowner with proving that the level of force they used was “reasonable.” That word is a lawyer’s dream and a citizen’s nightmare.

In Lindsay, Ontario, a man found himself facing an intruder armed with a crossbow in the middle of the night. In the chaos, he stabbed the intruder. Instead of being treated as a victim of crime, he was charged with aggravated assault. The politicians quickly turned the case into a stage play. Doug Ford and Pierre Poilievre pounded their chests and talked about fixing self-defense laws. The truth is the law already allows for reasonable force, but the real problem is that “reasonable” is interpreted in courtrooms long after the moment of terror and generally in favour of the intruder. A man defending his family should not have to wait two years for a judge to tell him if his split-second instincts were politically correct.

A father of four was recently murdered in his home in Vaughan during a break-in, right in front of his children. The response from York Regional Police Chief Jim MacSween was that the best defense during a home invasion is to hide and comply. The message to families is simple: lie down, pray the criminals are merciful, and hope you survive. That is not policing. That is surrender to evil dressed up as advice.

Canadians and their leaders have refused to adopt a true castle doctrine. In many U.S. states, when someone invades your home, the law is crystal clear: you are not required to retreat, you are not required to measure your blows with a ruler, and you are not required to gamble your children’s lives on what a Crown prosecutor will think is “reasonable.” In Canada, the law presumes that life and death decisions can be neatly reviewed with hindsight. The result is that victims are often treated like suspects. Homeowners live with the threat of jail after already living through the trauma of attack.

The defenders of the current system will argue that the flexibility of “reasonable force” prevents vigilantism. They say every case is different, so the law must be broad. The lived reality is different. The ambiguity does not stop violence. It only punishes the people who fight back, and criminals already know the law is stacked in their favor. They know most homeowners hesitate, because they are not sure if the system will protect them, and that hesitation can be fatal.

It is time for political, legal, and judicial clarity. If someone breaks into a home, the law should give the homeowner every possible benefit of the doubt. The focus must be on the intruder who caused the danger, not the father, or mother forced to respond. A castle doctrine does not equal anarchy. It means recognizing that the home is a last line of defense, and once crossed by force, the homeowner’s actions should be presumed justified.

Public officials who tell people to “comply” are insulting every Canadian who still believes in personal responsibility and are a threat to the citizens they are supposed to serve. Compliance is not safety; it is cowardly submission. Families have a right to live without the fear that the very act of survival will turn them into defendants.

When the law cannot distinguish between an armed criminal and the man who stopped him, the system has failed. The right to self-defense is not an American concept, it is a basic human right. It is time to stop criminalizing fundamental human survival. The next father killed in his own home deserves better than a lecture about compliance. He deserves a law that values his life more than the rights of the man who came to destroy it. Home invaders are dangerous criminals, it is long past time to treat them accordingly.