Visiting Canada with a DUI
The subject of whether or not a person can visit Canada if they’ve got a criminal record of any kind, particularly DUIs (drunk driving), comes up so often on travel Forums that I thought I’d post the regs here for easy access.
The summary, cut-and-pasted from canadainternational.gc.ca (the easiest-to-understand official page) is:
“Security and enforcement at the Canada-United States border has heightened in recent years. For this reason, more U.S. citizens with past criminal charges or convictions are refused entry into Canada.
Almost all convictions (including DUI, reckless driving, misdemeanour drug possession, all felonies, shoplifting, etc.) make a person inadmissible to Canada, regardless of how long ago they occurred. For this reason, it is not recommended that persons with past convictions attempt to enter Canada without first obtaining necessary documents. It is always the final decision of officers at ports of entry to decide whether a person is allowed into Canada.“
The page linked above also describes ways that people affected by these regulations can overcome “criminal inadmissibility”.
On average, 4 Canadians are killed and 200 injured by drunk drivers every day. See what MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving ) is doing to stop that.
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