Toronto Robbery Lawyers

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Robbery is where a property offence becomes a crime of violence, and Canadian law marks the change bluntly. There is no summary route: every robbery charge is straight indictable with a maximum of life imprisonment, whether the allegation is a shove over a phone or a firearm at a cash register. If a restricted or prohibited firearm is alleged, a five-year mandatory minimum and reverse-onus bail come with it. Toronto prosecutes robbery hard, the TPS Hold Up Squad has existed since 1958 for exactly this offence, and defending it well means moving early, at the bail stage. Kazandji Law defends robbery charges across Toronto. Call 647-588-3234, 24 hours a day.

By Fadi Matthew Kazandji, Founding Partner, Kazandji Law. Toronto criminal defence. Updated July 2026.

The Four Ways Robbery Is Committed. Section 343

Section 343 of the Criminal Code defines one offence with four distinct doors into it, and which door the Crown alleges shapes the entire defence:

Mode	What the Crown must show	The catch most people miss
s. 343(a)	Stealing, using violence or threats of violence to a person or property to extort the property or to prevent or overcome resistance	Threats to property count, not just threats to people
s. 343(b)	Stealing from a person and wounding, beating, striking or using personal violence at the time, immediately before or immediately after	Violence seconds after the taking, at the door, in the parking lot, still makes it robbery
s. 343(c)	Assaulting any person with intent to steal	No completed theft is required, an assault plus intent is a full robbery
s. 343(d)	Stealing while armed with an offensive weapon or imitation of one	A fake gun or replica counts expressly, the imitation is enough

Two consequences follow from that structure. First, "armed robbery" is not a separate Criminal Code offence, there is only s. 343 robbery, and weapon or firearm involvement operates through the punishment section (s. 344) and the bail provisions rather than through a different charge. Second, the boundaries of each mode are the defence terrain: whether words amounted to a threat of violence, whether a scuffle at a store exit was "personal violence" connected to the taking, whether the intent to steal existed at the moment of an assault, and whether an object qualifies as an offensive weapon or imitation. Robbery counts frequently fail down to theft or assault when the connecting tissue, the nexus between force and taking, does not hold.

Theft vs Robbery: One Shove Changes Everything

Theft alone is a property offence with a hybrid, value-graded punishment scheme: theft under $5,000 carries up to two years on indictment, theft over $5,000 up to ten (ss. 322, 334), and both can proceed summarily. The moment violence, a threat of violence, an assault with intent to steal, or a weapon enters the picture, s. 343 converts the file into a straight indictable offence of violence carrying a maximum of life imprisonment, the single steepest escalation in the property-crime lattice.

That cliff edge is where many Toronto files are actually fought. The shoplifting that ends with a security guard grabbing a sleeve and a reflexive push at the exit; the drug-debt confrontation recast as a robbery; the schoolyard demand for a phone between teenagers, in each, the legal difference between theft (or assault) and robbery is the nexus between the force and the taking, and the evidence on that nexus is usually thin, fast and contested. Because theft is complete the moment the thing is moved with intent to steal (s. 322(2)), the sequencing of force and taking, captured on store video or described inconsistently by witnesses, becomes decisive. Getting a robbery reduced to its component parts is not a technicality; it is the difference between a life-maximum offence of violence and charges with entirely different sentencing and record consequences. The theft-side framework is covered on our Toronto assault page and the firm's theft resources.

Penalties After Bill C-5: What Is Actually Left

Section 344 was rewritten by Parliament in 2022, and much of what the internet says about robbery sentencing is now wrong. The current law:

• Every robbery: straight indictable, maximum life imprisonment, s. 344(1)(b) applies life as the ceiling even where no weapon is involved.
• Restricted or prohibited firearm, or any firearm in association with a criminal organization: mandatory minimum of 5 years for a first offence and 7 years for a second or subsequent offence (s. 344(1)(a)), with the repeat-offence escalator counting prior convictions for listed firearm offences within a ten-year window (s. 344(2)).
• The old 4-year minimum for robbery with any other firearm, former s. 344(1)(a.1), was repealed by the Bill C-5 amendments (S.C. 2022, c. 15, s. 12). Robbery with a non-restricted firearm, a knife, an imitation weapon or no weapon at all now carries no mandatory minimum, a life maximum, with full judicial discretion below it.

Where no minimum applies, sentencing runs on ordinary principles, gravity, role, record, aggravating and mitigating factors, with outcomes across a wide range that the defence shapes through the trial record and sentencing materials. Because robbery is straight indictable, discharges and the lightest dispositions available for hybrid offences are structurally harder to reach, and the realistic strategy in defensible files is usually to attack the robbery characterization itself.

Sentencing Without a Minimum. Where Robbery Outcomes Are Actually Decided

Outside the firearm-minimum lane, robbery sentencing is pure judicial discretion between zero and life, which means outcomes are driven by the factors counsel can actually move. The gravity axis: degree and duration of violence, weapon reality versus imitation, injury, vulnerability of the person robbed, planning versus impulse, and the mandatory s. 348.1 aggravation where an occupied home was involved. The offender axis: age and maturity (an 18-year-old first offender in a group phone robbery is a different sentencing exercise than a repeat commercial robber), record, addiction and mental-health context, Gladue factors for Indigenous offenders, employment and family circumstance, and everything done between charge and sentence, counselling, education, restitution where it fits.

Three structural notes matter. First, because robbery is straight indictable with a life maximum, the lightest disposals available for hybrid offences are structurally constrained, which is why, in borderline files, the highest-value work is repositioning the charge itself to theft or assault rather than arguing for leniency on a robbery count. Second, where the s. 344(1)(a) minimum does apply, sentencing advocacy shifts to the elements: whether the firearm was genuinely restricted or prohibited and whether it was used in the commission, because below the minimum there is nothing to argue. Third, for accused under 18, the YCJA displaces this entire framework with custody-as-last-resort principles, one reason the adult and youth versions of the same robbery produce radically different outcomes.

Every sentencing submission we file in a robbery case is built like a brief: verified personal history, treatment records, surety and employment letters, and a principled position on where this file sits against the pattern of comparable cases, assembled from the first month of the retainer, not the last.

Bail for Robbery in Toronto, and When the Onus Flips

Robbery is not a s. 469 offence, so bail is decided in the Ontario Court of Justice, in Toronto, all adult bail runs through the Toronto Regional Bail Centre at 2201 Finch Avenue West, including weekend and statutory-holiday courts. In the ordinary case the Crown bears the onus of justifying detention under s. 515. But robbery files trip the reverse-onus switches in s. 515(6) more often than almost any other charge, and knowing which switch is live determines how the hearing must be prepared:

• Firearm alleged: robbery "alleged to have been committed with a firearm" is expressly listed, s. 515(6)(a)(vii), and the accused must show cause why detention is not justified.
• Weapons prohibition in place: an offence involving a firearm or other listed weapon committed while under a s. 84(1) prohibition order flips the onus (s. 515(6)(a)(viii)).
• On release already: an indictable offence allegedly committed while on release for another indictable offence (s. 515(6)(a)(i)).
• Criminal organization allegations (s. 515(6)(a)(ii)) and recent repeat weapon-violence, a violence-with-a-weapon charge within five years of a prior conviction for the same, where both carry ten-year-plus maximums (s. 515(6)(b.2)).

Reverse onus does not mean automatic detention, it means the defence must arrive with a plan that answers the s. 515(10) grounds head-on: sureties with real supervisory capacity, residence, reporting, and conditions tailored to the allegation. A robbery bail hearing lost for lack of preparation costs months in custody and hardens the file; our Toronto bail page covers the TRBC process, surety mechanics and the June 2026 bail practice directions in detail.

Home Invasion Robbery

"Home invasion" is not a separate Criminal Code charge, it is a statutory aggravating circumstance. Under s. 348.1, where a robbery (or listed break-in offence) is committed in relation to a dwelling-house, the sentencing court must treat as aggravating the fact that the dwelling was occupied, that the person knew or was reckless as to occupation, and that violence or threats were used. In Toronto these files are investigated by the Hold Up Squad's home-invasion mandate, prosecuted at the top of the robbery range, and defended on two fronts at once: the identity and participation evidence (these are frequently multi-party allegations built on association evidence) and the occupancy-knowledge element that s. 348.1 itself requires. Where a firearm allegation attaches, the s. 344(1)(a) minimums and reverse-onus bail follow, the maximal version of the offence on every axis.

How Toronto Investigates Robbery, the Hold Up Squad

Toronto is one of the few Canadian cities with a robbery-dedicated investigative unit. Established in 1958 in response to a wave of violent bank robberies, the unit, now "SCI. Hold Up" within Specialized Criminal Investigations at 40 College Street, investigates robberies of retail businesses, financial institutions and armoured-truck personnel, and home-invasion robberies, responding to scenes 24/7. Street-level robberies are generally handled by divisional investigators. The scale is significant: TPS open data records roughly three thousand robbery offences reported in Toronto in a recent year.

What that means for the defence: robbery files are identification files. The Crown's case is typically assembled from CCTV canvasses, photo lineups, cell-tower and device data, clothing-and-gait comparisons and, in multi-party cases, association evidence. Every one of those layers has known failure modes, cross-racial identification frailty, suggestive lineup procedure, video quality that supports description but not identification, phones that place a person near a place without putting hands on property. Robbery trials are won by auditing the identification chain link by link, and that audit starts with full disclosure of how the lineup was built and how the video canvass was conducted. Where a search or device extraction produced the key evidence, the Charter analysis runs alongside.

Consequences Beyond the Sentence

• Mandatory weapons prohibition. On conviction for an indictable offence involving used, threatened or attempted violence punishable by ten years or more, robbery qualifies, s. 109 makes a weapons prohibition mandatory: at least ten years for non-restricted firearms and life for prohibited and restricted items on a first offence, and life across the board on a subsequent one.
• Immigration. Robbery's life maximum makes a conviction serious criminality territory for non-citizens under IRPA s. 36(1)(a), a permanent resident's status can be lost on conviction regardless of the sentence imposed. Any non-citizen facing a robbery count needs coordinated criminal-immigration advice before any resolution decision.
• The record. A robbery conviction is a conviction for a violent, life-maximum offence, the single heaviest label a property-adjacent file can produce, with lasting employment, travel and vulnerable-sector consequences. Outcome positioning, robbery versus theft versus assault, matters for decades.
• Youth. A significant share of Toronto robbery charges involve accused aged 12 to 17, phone and sneaker robberies among teenagers are a staple of the youth courts at 10 Armoury Street. The YCJA lane changes everything: different sentencing principles, records regimes and release rules; see our Toronto youth criminal defence page.

Defence Angles That Decide Robbery Trials

Identity. The dominant issue in stranger robberies, tested through the lineup procedure, the video record, the descriptive inconsistencies and the alibi evidence. An identification case that looks solid in a synopsis routinely loosens once the underlying materials arrive.

The nexus between force and taking. Robbery requires the violence or threat to be connected to the stealing in the way s. 343 describes. Force applied for another purpose, a fight that precedes an opportunistic taking, a struggle over disputed property, and takings where the "threat" is retrospective interpretation, both break the nexus and reduce the file to its components.

The weapon element. Under s. 343(d) the Crown must prove the accused was armed with an offensive weapon or imitation; under s. 344(1)(a) it must prove the firearm was restricted or prohibited and used in the commission. Object identification from video stills, recovered-item continuity and the restricted-classification evidence are all contestable, and with the 4-year minimum repealed, the classification fight is where the mandatory-minimum stakes now live.

Participation. Multi-party robberies run on party-liability theories: presence plus association is not enough, and the line between lookout and bystander is argued on phones, video and after-the-fact conduct.

Charter litigation. Arrests, searches incident, device extractions and statement-taking in robbery investigations move fast, and fast investigations make mistakes. Sections 8, 9, 10(b) and the Grant exclusion analysis are standard equipment in these files.

The Robbery Files Toronto Courts Actually See

The retail exit scuffle. A shoplifting allegation becomes robbery when force meets a loss-prevention officer at the door. The nexus question, was the push to escape with property, or just to escape?, plus the sequencing on store video decide whether this is theft, assault, or a life-maximum offence.

The phone robbery between young people. Demands for phones, jackets and sneakers among teenagers make up a steady stream of the youth court list at 10 Armoury. Identification and participation are the battlegrounds, and the YCJA lane changes outcomes fundamentally.

The commercial and bank file. SCI. Hold Up territory: organized canvasses, lineup procedure, note-and-demand evidence, sometimes an alleged imitation firearm. The weapon-classification and identification chains are the defence terrain.

The home invasion. Multi-party, firearm-alleged, reverse-onus, the maximal file. Participation theories and s. 348.1's occupancy-knowledge element frame the defence alongside identity.

The drug-adjacent confrontation. Disputed debts and rip-offs recast as robberies, where complainant credibility, colour-of-right on the property element, and what was actually said carry the trial.

The Toronto Process Map for a Robbery Charge

Arrest → bail at the Toronto Regional Bail Centre, 2201 Finch Avenue West (reverse onus if a firearm is alleged or another s. 515(6) trigger applies) → disclosure and case management at the Ontario Court of Justice, 10 Armoury Street. Toronto's consolidated criminal courthouse, which replaced Old City Hall, College Park and four other locations → election under s. 536: OCJ trial, or Superior Court with or without a jury → because robbery carries life, a preliminary inquiry is available on request (s. 535's 14-year threshold is met) → Superior Court trials at 361 University Avenue. The Jordan ceilings, 18 months for OCJ trials, 30 for Superior Court, run from the charge date, and in identification-heavy files with late disclosure, the s. 11(b) ledger is part of the strategy from day one.

The First 72 Hours After a Toronto Robbery Arrest

Robbery files harden quickly, identification procedures happen early, bail happens earlier, and what the first three days produce tends to follow the case to its end. The checklist we run with clients and families:

• Treat the bail hearing as the trial it is. If a firearm is alleged, the onus is reversed and an unprepared hearing means detention. Counsel needs surety candidates immediately, people with standing, stable addresses and the capacity to supervise, plus a residence plan and proposed conditions that answer the specific s. 515(10) grounds. At the Toronto Regional Bail Centre, the difference between a plan and a hope is measured in months of custody.
• Say nothing about the allegation, anywhere. Not in the police interview (get advice first, always), not on custody phone calls (recorded), not to cellmates, not on social media. Robbery prosecutions frequently feature the accused's own words filling gaps the identification evidence could not.
• Preserve the alibi and location record now. Phone location history, transit taps, purchase receipts, time-stamped messages, workplace records, the data that places you elsewhere degrades and gets overwritten. Counsel can also send preservation requests for third-party video the police canvass missed.
• Inventory what was seized. Clothing, footwear and phones taken on arrest become comparison exhibits. Knowing what the Crown has, and demanding the procedure records for any lineup shown to witnesses, starts the identification audit early.
• Map status and licence exposure before any decision. Non-citizens, firearms licence holders and anyone in a regulated occupation need the collateral-consequences analysis before resolution instructions are given, not after.
• Do not contact complainants or witnesses. Directly or through others, it breaches conditions, generates new charges, and converts a defensible file into a detention argument.

Families can do most of this legwork while counsel handles the courtroom: gathering surety documents, listing potential video locations, pulling records. The number to start that process is 647-588-3234, it answers at 3 a.m., because that is when robbery arrests happen.

Why Kazandji Law for a Toronto Robbery Charge

Robbery defence rewards speed and depth in equal measure: speed at the Toronto Regional Bail Centre, where reverse-onus hearings are won with preparation, and depth through disclosure, where identification cases are dismantled frame by frame. Kazandji Law brings senior counsel to both ends, bail advocacy at 2201 Finch, case management and trials at 10 Armoury Street, jury work at 361 University Avenue, with four GTA offices behind the file. If the charge should never have been robbery, we make that argument early, in writing, to the Crown; if the case must be tried, it is tried prepared. Free consultation, 24/7, at 647-588-3234. Related pages: Toronto weapons charges and the full criminal defence overview.

Robbery FAQ. Toronto

This page is legal information about Canadian robbery law as it applies in Toronto, Ontario, not legal advice about your case. Statutory references are to the Criminal Code as consolidated on the Justice Laws website; court, police and statistical details come from the Ontario Courts, City of Toronto and Toronto Police Service websites and open-data portal, current to July 2026. Robbery statistics are approximate offence-report counts subject to revision. Speak with a lawyer before acting on anything here. Kazandji Law, 180 John St, Unit 320, Toronto, 647-588-3234.