Alberta ABST common mistakes
Alberta ABST · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Reciting section 494 citizen's arrest as 'anyone can arrest anyone who commits an offence,' omitting the 'finds committing' element and the requirement to deliver the person to a peace officer without delay.
The wording is learned from films, colleagues, or second-hand shorthand rather than the statute itself, so the two-part test (finds committing a criminal offence, or reasonable grounds on a fresh pursuit after a criminal offence) collapses into a single vague idea.
What to do instead
Memorise s.494 as a checklist: (1) indictable offence - did I find the person committing it, or am I in fresh pursuit with reasonable grounds; (2) summary offence - must actually find them committing it; (3) deliver to a peace officer forthwith; (4) release if no lawful grounds. Practise writing the test out for three scenario types until you can do it without prompts.
Answering that trespass is a criminal offence and is enforced by arrest under the Criminal Code, instead of identifying the Trespass to Premises Act and Petty Trespass Act as provincial statutes with their own notice and request-to-leave provisions.
Everyday language ('he was trespassing, so he was committing a crime') is carried into the exam, and the provincial and federal layers are never separated in the candidate's mind.
What to do instead
Build a two-column table - provincial trespass statutes versus Criminal Code mischief - and for each write who may act, what the precondition to act is, and what the remedy is. Before answering any trespass question, ask yourself: 'Is the question asking about a provincial offence or a criminal offence?'
Concluding that force was justified simply because the person was trespassing, combative, or 'resisting,' without analysing whether the force was reasonable, proportionate, and stopped once resistance ceased.
Candidates assume authority flows from the underlying wrong (trespass, theft) rather than from the force provision itself, so they skip the separate proportionality analysis the law requires.
What to do instead
For every use-of-force scenario, write four sentences before choosing an answer: what lawful authority was being exercised, what the person did, what force was used, and whether a lesser option was available. Then check s.25/s.26 concepts - reasonable and proportionate, no punishment, stop when the purpose is achieved.
Treating 'the law' as a single undifferentiated block - claiming regulations are made by judges, that common law outranks a statute, or that the Charter governs a private security guard exactly as it governs a police officer.
Candidates prepare by memorising outcomes rather than the structure of the Canadian legal system, so hierarchy, jurisdiction, and who is bound by what are never fixed in memory.
What to do instead
Draw the hierarchy once from memory (Constitution including Charter, federal and provincial statutes, regulations, common law/municipal bylaws) and annotate each level with who makes it and who it binds. Reuse the diagram when answering any Charter or jurisdiction question rather than guessing from the scenario's tone.
Assuming that holding the ABST training certificate is the same thing as holding a valid security worker licence, or that a licence covers any security job and any employer.
Training and licensing are taught close together, so the certificate is mentally filed as 'the licence,' and the renewal, employer-notification, and 'must be licensed before you work' rules are skimmed.
What to do instead
Write a one-page comparison of certificate versus licence: who issues it, what it authorises, how long it lasts, what conditions attach, what happens if you work without it. Test yourself by listing three things a licensed guard may not do.
Describing the security professional as a junior police officer - asserting powers to search a bag or person, to detain someone to 'investigate,' or to punish - rather than as a private person with common-law and statutory authority limited to property and contract.
The role is understood from media portrayals and from on-the-job bravado rather than from the industry introduction material, and candidates confuse authority derived from the client's property rights with public police powers.
What to do instead
For each power you think a guard has (arrest, search, detain, use force, seize), write the source of that power - statute section, common law, or contract - and what happens if the source is absent. If you cannot name the source in ten seconds, treat the power as not existing.
Writing reports full of conclusions and opinions ('the subject was drunk and aggressive,' 'he was obviously going to steal') rather than observable facts, and leaving out the who/what/when/where/how elements or failing to attribute overheard statements to their source.
People naturally narrate in summary and judgement, and under time pressure the report is written as a story to a colleague rather than as a record for a reader who was not present.
What to do instead
Apply a two-pass method: first draft the timeline of raw observations (what was seen, heard, said, done, with times), then a second pass that deletes or converts any word describing a state of mind or an inference into the specific behaviour that produced it. Attribute every statement as hearsay ('Smith stated to me that…') and check that each of the six key elements is answered before finishing.
Making notes after the shift ends rather than at the time of the event, rewriting or typing them into a clean version, and discarding or 'tidying up' the original pages.
Notes are treated as an administrative chore for the employer rather than as the foundation of any later testimony or report, and candidates do not realise that the original is the record and the rewrite is a copy with no independent value.
What to do instead
Adopt the habit now: note time, date, and location at the moment of the event, initial and date each page, correct errors with a single line and initials rather than erasure, and never destroy the original after producing a report. Practise by writing notes for a scenario, then a report, and confirming the report can be reconstructed from the notes alone.
Failing to secure the immediate scene or to move to safety before calling 911, and mishandling physical items - picking up, pocketing, or handing off an item without recording who held it, when, and where it went.
Emergency scenarios create urgency, and the candidate acts out of the instinct to help or to grab the object rather than following a priority order; chain-of-continuity is seen as paperwork that applies only to police.
What to do instead
Memorise and rehearse the priority order - your own safety, then life safety of others, then calling for emergency services, then preserving the scene and property. For any item, record the four facts on a continuity log at the moment of transfer: description, from whom, to whom, date and time. Practise on a scenario where you must both assist a casualty and preserve an item.
Transmitting on the radio in ways that lose the message - not identifying the unit, using unexplained codes, speaking before the channel is clear, failing to acknowledge or confirm, and not recording the time and content of the call.
Radio traffic is modelled on casual conversation or on television shorthand, and the operational purpose of a loggable, unambiguous record is never made explicit to the candidate.
What to do instead
Use a fixed structure every time: identify yourself, state your location, state the situation in plain language, state what you need, then confirm receipt. Before transmitting, plan the message in one sentence. After any significant transmission, note the time, channel, and substance in your notebook so a third party could reconstruct the exchange.