Image Credit: FACEBOOK: Canadian Border Services Agency

A former Canadian Border Services Agency officer who claimed that being frisked before an interview in Chilliwack amounted to assault has lost her chance to sue her former colleagues.

According to a Nov. 4 B.C. Supreme Court decision, Jannelle Buchanan filed a lawsuit against two former colleagues that had frisked her before an interview.

While Canadian Border Services Agency officers are well known for frisking travellers at Canada's borders, Buchanan argued the pat-down search she received "constituted an assault."

The incident dates back to 2016 when Buchanan worked for the Canadian Border Services Agency as a firearms instructor.

In October of that year, she made a formal complaint about one of her colleagues. The colleague was investigated and found to have committed professional misconduct and fired.

During the process, Buchanan was called to the Canadian Border Services Agency's Chilliwack office for an interview. She was searched prior to the interview and told she was being frisked because she had made a threat that she was going to be armed.

The decision said she sent a text message to a colleague saying she would attend the interview "gunned up lol."

The text was in reference to her driving her Canadian Border Services Agency vehicle and appearing in uniform, which includes a baton and a gun, to the interview.

Ultimately, she didn't appear in uniform and drove her own car to the interview.

However, she was still frisked.

In 2019, she launched a legal suit against the two colleagues that conducted the interview.

The notice of civil claims states "there was no threat, nor was it possible to interpret her text to a coworker in such a fashion," and that "it was obvious from her clothing that she could not be concealing a gun."

She also argued the Canadian Border Services Agent who frisked her had no legal authority to do so, and investigators went through her personal telephone without justification.

Somewhere along the way she resigned from the Canadian Border Services Agency.

The decision said Buchanan also filed a federal human rights complaint, which is on hold pending the outcome of the B.C. suit.

She also took the issue internally but had her case dismissed.

The two former colleagues Buchanan is suing, Gregory Zbitnoff and Franca Passanante both deny liability.

The Attorney General of Canada is also named in the suit and launched the current application to have the case thrown out.

The decision goes through the complex legalities of federal public sector labour relations and whether the case can be heard in the B.C. Supreme Court.

Buchanan argued it's a rare case that can be heard in court.

However, Justice Wilson disagreed.

"I do not accept (Buchanan's) submission that this case is exceptional. There is nothing in this case that would distinguish it from the circumstances found in other cases," the justice said.

The justice said Buchanan could have taken her internal grievance further or appealed the result.

"Simply put, there is no evidence of a flawed process, nor of an exhausting of all of her possible remedies," the decision read.

"In all of the circumstances, I conclude that there is nothing exceptional about this case," the justice said.

The justice ultimately decided the B.C. Supreme Court did not have jurisdiction over the case so, therefore, Buchanan could not move forward with it and dismissed the case.

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