Ontario man given three tickets by ‘the smoke police’ for having a cigarette alone in his SUV
Mike Hensen/The London Free Press/Postmedia NetworkHarry Kraemer has run into issues with the anti-smoking enforcement officers before
LONDON, Ont. — Harry Kraemer knows darn well that smoking isn’t good for you but it’s a 60-year habit he doesn’t want to break.
The 76-year-old owner of Sparkles Cleaning Service is a healthy guy who loves a puff or two when he’s alone, sometimes at home with the windows open in his rec room or in his Porsche SUV, minding his own business and away from others who could breathe in his second-hand fumes.
What he doesn’t like are those he calls “the smoke police,” the Smoke-Free Ontario enforcement officers who he believes have placed a no-smoking sign as a target on his back.
The provincial anti-smoking laws set out stringent rules banning smoking in enclosed workplaces, enclosed public places, outdoor patios and vehicles where children are passengers and other spaces to protect people from second-hand smoke.
But Kraemer scored one for the Marlboro Man last week when he had three workplace smoking infractions dismissed at Provincial Offences Court.
Kraemer was slapped with the charges last fall for lighting up inside his luxury SUV in a parking lot at Baseline and Wellington roads, just after he’s bought a doughnut and coffee from Tim Hortons.
The vehicle’s ownership is registered to Sparkles and the argument was it is a workplace vehicle. Kraemer said it is for his personal use.
“This is my personal car that I drive from home to work and from work to home,” he said.
“The justice of the peace said, ‘I haven’t heard one shred of evidence that that car was ever used for business for Sparkles,'” said the victorious Kraemer.
To back up a little bit, Kraemer has already paid financial penalties for his bad habit and likely ruffled the feathers of the anti-smoking authorities.
About a year ago, an enforcement officer came to his business on Wellington Road for a routine check. Kraemer said he tended to smoke in his second-floor office away from the rest of the business with the door closed, the window open and a fan blowing.
Pretty soon we can’t have a smoke except in the middle of some farmer’s field
“There’s no smoke that ever goes down to where the employees are,” he said.
Kraemer said the officer came into his office and opened a desk drawer to discover an ash tray and a butted out cigarette. He issued two tickets to Kraemer, each carrying a $350 fine.
That didn’t go over well with Kraemer. “I was annoyed. Isn’t one ticket enough?”
Kraemer had some words with the officer and told him to leave. “I verbally told him to get the hell out of my office and I said some very nasty things maybe, I don’t know.”
The officer, Kraemer said, told him, “We’ll be back.”
Kraemer paid the fines. Last fall came the tickets in the Tim Hortons lot — for smoking in an enclosed workplace, failing to have a no-smoking sign in his SUV, and failing to properly supervise a workplace.
The enforcment officer testified he was acting on “an anonymous complaint” when he watched Kraemer get into his SUV, drive to the coffee shop and through the drive-through and park.
“I proceeded to have my coffee, my doughnut and my cigarette, and he walked up and he gave me three tickets,” Kraemer said.
Stan Behal/PostmediaThe Smoke-Free Ontario Act came into effect in 2006, banning cigarettes from a number of public areas including workplaces
With possible fines that could have run into thousands of dollars, Kraemer took it to court.
His defence lawyer Gordon Cudmore successfully argued that Kraemer wasn’t an employee, the SUV wasn’t a workplace where an employee might actually work and that “common sense” would dictate that Kraemer wasn’t breaking any smoking law.
No vaccum, broom, dustpan or work papers were found inside the vehicle and there was no distinctive Sparkles logo on the car with the rendering of a young woman with a dust mop that’s on the company’s fleet of white cars with green and yellow signage.
Kraemer isn’t even an employee. He’s a shareholder who is paid with dividends from the business.
The justice of the peace agreed that the tickets went a step too far.
“It’s just a waste of taxpayers’ money as far as I’m concerned,” Cudmore said about the charges.
“And the law was never intended to consider a situation like this.”
Kraemer went one step further. “Who would use a Porsche to do house cleaning with?” he said.
I proceeded to have my coffee, my doughnut and my cigarette, and he walked up and he gave me three tickets
“If a Porsche pulled up to your house to clean your house, you would say, ‘What the hell is going on here.'”
Linda Stobo, program manager for the chronic disease prevention and tobacco control team at the Middlesex-London Health Unit, said though she couldn’t speak specifically about the Kraemer case, she believes the investigators were not out of bounds when they charged him in his SUV.
“The purpose of the Smoke-Free Ontario Act is to protect people from the harmful exposure to second-hand smoke at work,” she said.
A workplace vehicle under the law is a vehicle used for any type of work, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Stobo said.
She added the health unit receives complaints “very frequently” from people exposed to second-hand smoke or have seen people exposed to second-hand smoke while at work.
The health unit received 100 complaints last year and are up over 20 this year. “We have a duty under the law to investigate,” Stobo said.
Now that the smoke has settled in his case, Kraemer agrees that there is some value in the provincial no-smoking laws, but added, “I find some of the smoke police are overzealous as we found in this case.
“Very soon, they’ll keep coming and coming and coming at us and pretty soon we can’t have a smoke except in the middle of some farmer’s field.”
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