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EDMONTON — A British Columbia man caught driving with his phone in his hand was acquitted after he successfully argued that he was just holding it.

While the excuse of “I was just holding it” hasn’t typically been successful in the courts, a B.C. judge found last month that Patrick Tannhauser couldn’t have been using his phone because an unspecified app locks it while it’s in motion. Therefore, he was not distracted, at least as B.C.’s laws are written.

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But the ruling doesn’t give much hope to defendants: the defence may not work outside the province because it relied on the specific wording of B.C.’s distracted driving statute, and in recent weeks a separate provincial court ruling disputed the justice’s reasoning.

What the ruling does do, though, is highlight the limits of a very broad piece of legislation, said University of Calgary law professor Lisa Silver.

“When you draft legislation like this, you’re going to get arguments, that’s what’s going to happen,” she said. “For the Crown to take the position that ‘well he held it, that’s enough,’ I agree with the (judicial justice), that’s not what this section’s about, that’s not what it’s after, right?”