Jury dismissed in latest twist at Hockey Canada sexual assault trial
Article content
A second jury has been dismissed and the case will be proceeding by judge alone at the sexual assault trial of five players from Canada's championship-winning 2018 world junior hockey team.
Article content
Ontario Superior Court of Justice Maria Carroccia discharged the jury without giving reasons Friday morning.
Article content
'I know that you have invested four weeks in this trial. You have the thanks of myself, court staff and counsel,' Carroccia told the jury shortly after 10 a.m. 'You are free to go.'
Article content
Article content
Michael McLeod, 27, Carter Hart, 26, Alex Formenton, 25, Dillon Dube, 26, and Cal Foote, 26, all of whom went on to pro careers including in the National Hockey League, have each pleaded not guilty to sexual assault stemming from events at the Delta Armouries hotel June 18 and 19, 2018, when the world championship team was in London for a Hockey Canada gala.
Article content
Article content
The Crown has argued that the woman, then 20, went to the hotel with McLeod for consensual sex after meeting him at Jack's bar on Richmond Row. After the sex and unbeknownst to her, McLeod invited the men to the room for 'a three-way.'
Article content
The woman, whose name is protected by a publication ban, concluded her testimony at the trial earlier this week. During cross-examination, defence counsel suggested the woman was the aggressor, who wanted McLeod to invite the other men to the room for 'a wild night.'
Article content
Carroccia's decision to discharge the jury was made following legal arguments by the Crown and defence held without the presence of the jury on Thursday afternoon. The details of the arguments cannot be reported on.
Article content
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Ottawa Citizen
2 hours ago
- Ottawa Citizen
Lam sisters confessed to killing mom, murder trial jury hears
Two Ottawa sisters confessed to killing their elderly mom in her sleep while being investigated by police, jurors were told Tuesday afternoon as a murder trial got underway at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice. Article content Chau Kanh Lam and Hue Ai Lam are charged with first-degree murder in relation to the death of their mother, Kieu Lam, on Oct. 31, 2022. Article content Article content In their opening address, Crown prosecutors outlined the case, telling the jury both sisters gave detailed statements to the police that they killed their mother. The Crown alleged that they struck Kieu in the head with a hammer, rendering her unconscious, before strangling her to death. Article content Article content The Crown said the two sisters attacked their mother when she was 'sleeping and lifeless,' unable to defend herself or to call for help. Article content Article content 'She gave them life, and they took her life,' prosecutors said. Article content The Crown said Chau then called 911, telling the dispatcher through a Vietnamese interpreter that she and Hue had killed their mother. At one point, Chau even spelled out the word 'kill,' they alleged. Article content The Crown then accused the sisters of planning to kill their mother in the days leading up to the attack because they were mad and angry at her for how they said she treated them. Article content Both Chau and Hue pleaded not guilty to the charges on Monday morning. The trial is scheduled to last five weeks. Article content Crown calls first witness Article content After the opening statement, the Crown called its first witness, Marlo Carlo Villalobos, who was then an ambulance communications officer for the Ottawa Paramedic Service. Article content Article content Villalobos said he primarily took 911 calls and gathered as much information as possible before sending an ambulance to each location when he worked in Ottawa between January 2021 to March 2024. He now lives in Montreal. Article content Article content Jurors then heard an audio recording of the 911 call between Villalobos and Chau. They were also provided a transcript of that call, including a certified translation of the Vietnamese portions. Article content Throughout the call, Villalobos tried to extract information from Chau, but had difficulty understanding her due to the language barrier. He then called the Ottawa Police Service and told the police dispatcher that 'somebody killed their mom.' Article content He then requested a Vietnamese interpreter through LanguageLine Solutions, a service used by the Ottawa Paramedic Service to obtain translation over the phone.
Vancouver Sun
9 hours ago
- Vancouver Sun
Hockey Canada trial verdict date set as defence questions woman's credibility
Digging through the testimony of a woman accusing Team Canada hockey players of sexual assault was, their lawyers say, 'an exercise in fact-finding frustration.' In their closing arguments so far at the high-profile trial, defence teams for some players described to the judge how the complainant gave well-rehearsed, 'revisionist' answers to suit her 'agenda.' 'When you read through this witness's evidence, similarly to listening to it, it is an exercise in fact-finding frustration at every turn,' said Megan Savard, defence lawyer for goaltender Carter Hart. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. 'The manner of testifying obscures rather than illuminates the core of what she did, why she did it, what others did, how she felt and how and why she changed her account over time.' Savard said the way the woman testified was deliberate. 'The goal is to obscure because this witness knows that the truth will not serve her agenda, which is to see her non-consent story accepted and believed.' Savard made her comments at the conclusion of her argument Tuesday as the trial is in the home-stretch. Two more defence teams and the Crown still have to make arguments, but Superior Court Justice Maria Carroccia set July 24 as the date for her ultimate decision. Hart, 26, Michael McLeod, 27, Alex Formenton, 25, Dillon Dube, 26, and Cal Foote, 26, all members of the 2018 championship team, have pleaded not guilty to sexual assault in connection with what happened in McLeod's room at the Delta Armouries hotel in London on June 18 and 19, 2018, where they were staying for a Hockey Canada gala and golf tournament. McLeod also has pleaded not guilty to a second charge of sexual assault for being a party to an offence. Consent is the central issue in the trial, which began in late April and has explored what happened at Jack's bar on Richmond Row, where McLeod met the woman – who was 20 at the time and whose identity is protected by court order – before bringing her back to the hotel for consensual sex. The woman has testified she was intoxicated and forced into unwanted sexual activities when some of the team – up to 10 at one point – assembled in McLeod's room. The accused players have testified the woman was the aggressor, begging them for sexual activity. And, they say, all sex was consensual. Savard, Formenton's lawyer Daniel Brown and Dube's defence lawyer Lisa Carnelos all questioned the woman's credibility, pointing out she was often recalling what she was 'feeling' or 'thinking' or making assumptions based on her own character assessment. 'Once you realize what the witness is doing, it becomes impossible to accept any isolated, seemingly factual assertion about her state of mind at face value,' Savard said. Brown echoed Savard's concerns about the woman's credibility, focusing on what happened between her and Formenton. 'This evidence in the case overwhelmingly establishes that (the woman) consented to have sex with Alex Formenton. (She) repeatedly asked someone in the room to have sex with her and Mr. Formenton agreed to do so, in private, away from the larger group with the use of a condom,' he added. 'They did this because she wanted to have sexual intercourse and he did this because he wanted to have sex. They both agreed. It's not complicated.' Brown went deeper into his analysis of the woman's testimony, and how it conflicts with the security video evidence from both Jack's bar and the hotel lobby and what witnesses said. 'Where there was video evidence, it was demonstrated that (the woman's) testimony was exaggerated or false,' he said, adding that people who were in the hotel room couldn't corroborate her description of 'the oppressive atmosphere', where she claimed she was threatened, spit on and slapped. Brown reminded Carroccia that Formenton was still in high school at the time. 'What we know is that, especially when we're dealing with a case involving lots of young adults, sometimes consensual sex is regrettable later, especially when alcohol is consumed and inhibitions are lowered,' he said, noting that isn't just true for the woman, but also the players. 'That the sex in this case was unusual or unenjoyable or embarrassing or even regrettable doesn't mean it wasn't consensual,' he said. Brown said the judge has heard the woman suggest 'multiple states of mind' during her testimony to bolster her claim she wasn't consenting: that she was too drunk; that she was an automaton and her mind and body separated; that her choice was taken from her; and that she is essentially a people-pleaser 'who had a difficult time saying no.' Brown said there was a fifth state of mind the defence thinks is the most truthful: that she was 'enthusiastically consenting to what happened in Room 209.' What she did, Brown said, was create 'a lie' to cover up cheating on her boyfriend and create a narrative to explain what people saw her doing at Jack's – kissing, hugging, grinding on the dance floor and holding hands with McLeod. 'It's a lot easier to explain to her friends and family that people did bad things to her rather than take responsibility for the choices she made,' he said, adding in her evidence, she placed blame on her friends, McLeod and the players. When the police closed their investigation in 2019 with no charges, the woman's 'quest for justice (was) just starting,' Brown said, and she pursued a civil action. 'She wants money. She wants a lot of money. She wants $3.5 million, and she's been told that whatever evidence she's claiming about extreme intoxication and whatever evidence she knows exists doesn't quite get her there. It's not enough,' he said. Her version became richer 'to create a story for Hockey Canada that she was coerced and forced into a sexual encounter.' Brown suggested the woman wasn't happy when London police re-opened the investigation because she knew her story would be scrutinized. She also didn't know about the video from Jack's, or undisclosed Facebook Messenger texts with her co-workers who were at the bar, which contradicted her version. So, Brown said, the woman testified her mind separated from her body and she took on 'a porn star persona' when she saw the men in the room after having consensual sex with McLeod. But Brown said the woman testified to making rational choices that were in contradiction with her automaton description. What the woman was doing, Brown suggested, was take 'bits and pieces of sort-of legal knowledge, tropes about how victims of sexual violence act and try to incorporate all of them into a unified theory.' The players, Brown said, never tried to 'obfuscate the truth' in a group chat that is evidence. 'It was a group chat designed to encourage the truth.' And Formenton was forthright, telling the police in 2018 he went back to the room he shared with McLeod after McLeod sent him a text message about sex and admitted fully to having consensual sex – a version that was corroborated by others. Carnelos said, given the woman's credibility issues, it 'would be very unsafe to convict Mr. Dube.' Unlike the woman, who, during the last seven years, 'continued to work on (her) narrative and not forget about this thing in pursuit of her civil claim,' the players were out living their lives before the case was re-opened. The resulting memory loss means no one can accurately re-create what happened in the hotel room, including the woman who has acknowledged gaps in her memory. Dube's voluntary audio statement to the police in 2018 should be relied on and 'establishes consent to oral sex and communications between the complainant and himself directly.' Dube described the woman begging the men for sex 'to the point she was threatening to leave' and calling them names. His encounter with her was brief, and he stopped it. What is missing from the interview is any reference to Dube touching the woman's buttocks. Carnelos suggested Dube 'didn't appreciate the significance, or simply had forgotten it' compared to the oral sex. The only person to see it was Crown witness Tyler Steenbergen, who testified the touch as like 'foreplay,' 'playful' and didn't happen during any oral sex. Carnelos reminded Carroccia of 'a really, really important piece of evidence', which showed the woman was fully aware of what was happening in the hotel room. She pointed to player Maxime Comtois, who came back to the hotel with Dube and went to McLeod's room. The woman discovered Comtois spoke French and she had a conversation with him in French. 'That would suggest that her mind was in that room and she was not threatened and on her own evidence, during that interaction, was enjoying herself,' Carnelos said. The trial continues. jsims@
Vancouver Sun
9 hours ago
- Vancouver Sun
Ottawa Senators confident of continued improvement next season
It has been 40 days since the Ottawa Senators saw their season come to an untimely end in the Battle of Ontario. Though the Senators were eliminated from the National Hockey League playoffs by the Toronto Maple Leafs in Game 6 of the first-round series on May 1, the faithful cheered their heroes off the ice after experiencing the big dance for the first time since 2017. Fans were excited because they knew there were better days ahead, and, as fans returned to Canadian Tire Centre on Tuesday night for the second Season Ticket Holders spring members summit, the organization remained confident that would be the case. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. 'We're just getting started,' Dave Poulin, the Senators' senior vice-president of hockey operations, told the fans. 'This has been fun to grow with you.' This is a busy time of year for Steve Staios, the president of hockey operations and general manager, and the rest of the staff. With NHL free agency set to start July 1, the off-season is going to continue to ramp up after the club held its amateur and pro scouting meetings in the past three weeks. Poulin noted the Senators had heavy lifting to do before the NHL draft on June 28-29. He said the organization was studying the free-agent market and was also trying to determine which players on the current roster they wanted to keep. The Senators are in negotiations with forwards Claude Giroux, Nick Cousins and Adam Gaudette and goaltender Anton Forsberg. It's anybody's guess if any of those players will return, but Forsberg and Gaudette are doubtful. There will be make changes, but Poulin said the growth would have to come from the core. A lot of that will be about consistency from the likes of Brady Tkachuk, Tim Stutzle, Drake Batherson, Dylan Cozens, Shane Pinto, Jake Sanderson, Thomas Chabot and Ridly Greig. 'We talked about the group learning in the playoffs and playing in the playoffs for the first time,' Poulin said. 'We have to carry that experience into the next year, and we have to increase our consistency, and we have to take our bandwidth to a higher level. 'When I talked about hockey players, when I was a coach, when I was a manager, as a player, they have a bandwidth, and we want them in that bandwidth, but we want them in the top end of that band, and you'll see some players that have huge highs, then huge lows, then huge highs, then huge lows, and as a group we have to get used to playing here on a more consistent basis that will eliminate the lows, increase the highs overall as a team, become more consistent.' Leeder said the club was able to grow its season ticket base by 1,000 thanks to the playoff run. It's believed the Senators had 7,500 season seats heading into last season, and they are striving to get closer to the 12,000 mark that would be around the NHL average. The Senators had 13 sellouts last season, and Brendan Du Vall, the club's head of ticketing, said he was confident the organization would have more than 20 sellouts next season. The club said it has had a 90-per-cent renewal rate for season tickets. 'We're still below where we need to be,' Leeder said. 'We're still below the league average, but we're making good progress. We'll see the benefits from the business side going into future years because we've been able to become a playoff team. 'We've got a team that we hope will be there regularly.' There wasn't much of an update on talks with the National Capital Commission to buy 10 acres of land to build a new rink at the LeBreton Flats site 10 minutes west of Parliament Hill. The two sides have said they'd like to have an agreement in place by the end of 2025. Leeder said those talks were ongoing. 'I can tell you that we're working hard with the NCC on the agreement; it's complicated. We are making progress,' Leeder said. 'We had a very productive meeting today that went well. 'I can tell the fans that we're committed to helping revitalize downtown, and we think a major event centre is a big part of that solution.' Leeder said that, since the Senators expected to be in their current home at Canadian Tire Centre for the foreseeable future, they will continue to make upgrades, including replacing old seats. The rink will celebrate its 30th anniversary with a game on Jan. 17. Originally named the Palladium, it opened on Jan. 15, 1996, with a concert by legendary Canadian rocker Bryan Adams. Leeder said the Senators tried to get Adams back on the same date 30 years later, but he was unable to make it work because he'll be on tour. He will play an anniversary concert in Ottawa on Oct. 4. bgarrioch@
