EDITOR’S NOTE: This story contains details that may be graphic. Reader discretion is advised.
The female complainant in the high-profile sexual assault trial of five former members of Canada’s world junior hockey team has begun testifying.
The woman, whose identity is protected under a standard publication ban, started her testimony Friday after two former teammates took the stand in the trial that began Monday.
The complainant, who has been referred to as E.M. in court documents, is appearing virtually in the courtroom. She is not testifying in front of the five defendants.
Michael McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dube and Callan Foote have all pleaded not guilty to sexual assault. McLeod has also pleaded not guilty to an additional charge of being a party to the offence of sexual assault.
The charges stem from what Crown prosecutors allege was non-consensual group sex in a London, Ont., hotel room back in June 2018.
The Crown has said the complainant, who was 20 at the time, agreed to have sex with McLeod in his hotel room after meeting him at a downtown bar on June 18.
After they had sex, prosecutor Heather Donkers alleged in her opening remarks McLeod started inviting other people into his hotel room. Donkers said the woman was drunk and uncomfortable, and tried to get through the night by doing what she thought the men wanted.
The complainant began her testimony Friday and said when she was at the bar on the night of June 18 with her friends, at one point she was closely dancing with McLeod and other teammates. She described herself as drunk, and having consumed vodka, beer and eight Jägerbomb shots.
“They would move my hand to touch their crotch area,” she alleged, adding she was “awkwardly going along with it, feeling it was a bit much.”
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The complainant said she was “just trying to dance and have fun.”
She said, “Outwardly, it appeared I was all right. There was a part of me thinking it was a lot.”
The complainant’s testimony ended around 4:30 p.m. on Friday after a day plagued by technical difficulties, including an extended break to fix the monitor she was asked to look at during the trial.
Her testimony is expected to resume on Monday, when the Crown has told the jury it will ask the complainant questions about what happened in the hotel room.
Teammates testify
Taylor Raddysh and Boris Katchouk, two members of the team that year, also testified this week.
Raddysh, who now plays in the NHL for the Washington Capitals, wrapped up his testimony Friday, as did Katchouk. Raddysh was asked what he remembers about several days in June 2018 when many of the team’s members were in London for a handful of events marking their victory in that year’s championship.
Court heard part of a transcript of a statement Raddysh gave in July 2018, in which he recalled seeing a woman in bed under the covers in the McLeod’s room.
In the statement, Raddysh said he wasn’t in the room for long and didn’t know if the woman was clothed, but that she “seemed fine.”
A series of videos taken the night of the alleged group sexual assault were played in court Wednesday. The videos, including one involving the complainant, were taken in the early morning hours of June 19 at the Delta hotel and were shown in quick succession.
In one video taken at 4:26 a.m., a young woman can be seen holding a white towel against her body, smiling and looking into the camera.
“It was all consensual,” she said, before asking if she was being filmed.
“You are so paranoid…. I enjoyed it,” she said, adding, “I am so sober, that’s why I can’t do this right now.”
In another video, taken about an hour earlier, someone asks the woman twice if she is “OK with this.” Both times she agrees.
Donkers has said the Crown plans to argue the videos are not evidence that the complainant did in fact, consent.
Jurors were also shown Wednesday a screenshot of a group chat, captured around 2:10 a.m. that day by Raddysh.
In it, McLeod asks if anyone wants to be in a “three-way,” then follows up with his hotel room number and Hart replies, “I’m in.”
The Crown is alleging as many as 10 people were present at some point. It was then that several sexual acts took place without the woman’s voluntary consent, the prosecution alleges.
Katchouk, who currently plays in the American Hockey League, told court Friday he left the bar with Foote earlier than the others, and picked up a slice of pizza on the way back to the hotel. Video footage of the hotel’s lobby showed the pair arriving at 2:23 a.m.
The two of them went to their respective floors, but before he could get to his room, Katchouk ran into McLeod in the hallway where he invited him into his room, he told the court.
Inside, “I saw a woman laying on the bed, under the sheets, as I was talking to Mikey,” Katchouk said.
McLeod asked him at one point whether he would like a “gummer,” or oral sex, which Katchouk believed would be from the woman, he said, adding that he laughed off the offer.
At another point, McLeod left the room and returned with Raddysh, Katchouk said. The three players talked for a bit before Raddysh suggested he and Katchouk leave, and the two of them took off, he added.
— with files from The Canadian Press
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