A freelance photojournalist says he was roughed up by Hamilton police and charged without cause at the scene of a disturbance at St. Joseph Healthcare's psychiatric hospital on Thursday.

Andrew Collins of Burlington says the incident happened after he refused a request by hospital security to delete all the video he had taken outside of the West 5th Street facility. Collins said he was already complying with a request to leave the grounds when this happened.

Police spokesperson Jackie Penman confirmed Collins was arrested and charged with trespassing. But she said it was because hospital security and Hamilton police alike repeatedly asked Collins to leave but he refused.

Collins was on the hospital grounds after 6:30 p.m. to capture possible news after reports of a hostage situation inside, which he said drew a large police presence.

The only video footage he got, however, was of police officers coming out of the hospital after the situation was over, he said.

Penman said police had responded to the hospital to assist with a person in crisis who was doing some damage inside a ward.

Collins said hospital security asked him to leave the grounds. He said he was packing up and leaving when a second security person demanded he delete video he captured.

When he refused to delete the video, security tried to remove his camera from inside his car, but did not succeed, Collins said. At that point, a Hamilton officer ran over "and tackled me to the ground and arrested me."

"I was asked to leave the property ... and I complied. But didn't comply with deleting all the video that was shot on the scene."

Collins is the third journalist Hamilton police have arrested and charged in the past year-and-a-half.