EDITOR’S NOTE: This story contains details that may be graphic. Reader discretion is advised.
The woman who alleges she was sexually assaulted by five former members of Canada’s world junior hockey team in 2018 says the “only safe thing to do was to give them what they were wanting.”
The complainant, whose identity is protected under a standard publication ban, made those remarks during her testimony in a London, Ont., courtroom on Monday in the high-profile trial of Michael McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dube and Callan Foote.
All five men have 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 McLeod’s hotel room in June 2018.
“They were loud with each other, back and forth and joking a lot,” the complainant, who has been referred to as E.M. in court documents, told the jury. She was not testifying in front of the five defendants, and was instead appearing virtually.
“(It) felt like I was being bullied, they were laughing at me, spitting at me at points, and slapping me.”
‘It seemed like a joke to them’
The female complainant began her testimony Friday and recounted the moment she met McLeod and his teammates at a bar in London on June 18, 2018. Court has heard many members of the team were in town at the time for a gala celebrating their gold-medal win earlier that year.
The complainant said in her testimony she was at the bar with her friends and, at one point, was closely dancing with McLeod and other teammates.
The complainant described herself as drunk, having consumed vodka, beer and eight Jägerbomb shots.
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“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.”
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 testified she went back to McLeod’s room at the Delta hotel and had consensual sex with him.
After they had sex, prosecutor Heather Donkers alleged in her opening remarks McLeod started inviting other people into his room. It was then that several sexual acts took place without the woman’s voluntary consent, the prosecution alleges.
The complainant said Monday two men arrived shortly after she had sex with McLeod and that more arrived in the room soon after while she was in the bathroom. She said the men wanted her to lie down on a bedsheet on the floor of the room.
“They had wanted me to lie down and touch myself, and they also had golf clubs that were in the room. I remember them making comments, about putting golf balls in me, in my vagina, asking me if I could take the whole club — the whole golf club in me,” the complainant alleged.
“It seemed like a joke to them, it was funny I was feeling intimidated, and not sure how to react.”
The complainant testified she gave oral sex to three men on the floor of the room, which she alleged was not consensual. She also said she had vaginal and oral sex with another man in the bathroom, which she alleged was also not consensual. The woman said she cried and at various points in the night, tried to leave but each time, someone would convince her to stay, she alleged.
The complainant testified she was uncomfortable and afraid, a point echoed by Donkers during opening remarks when she said the woman was drunk and uncomfortable and tried to get through the night by doing what she thought the men wanted. The Crown is alleging as many as 10 people were present at some point.
The complainant was recorded on multiple videos in the room that were shown in court last week, saying in one of them, “It was all consensual.” Donkers has said the Crown plans to argue those videos, allegedly taken by McLeod, are not evidence that the complainant did, in fact, consent.
Teammates testify about group chat, McLeod conversation
Before she began her testimony, Taylor Raddysh and Boris Katchouk — two members of the team that year — also testified.
Jurors were also shown a screenshot of a group chat, captured around 2:10 a.m. on June 19 by Raddysh, in which 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.”
Katchouk, who currently plays in the American Hockey League, said he ran into McLeod when he was on his way back to his room. He said he saw a woman “laying on the bed, under the sheets” in his room as they were talking.
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He alleged McLeod asked him at one point whether he would like a “gummer,” or oral sex, which Katchouk said he believed would be from the woman. He said he laughed off the offer.
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.”
Court was shown Monday text messages to the female complainant from McLeod the day after the alleged incident. In it, he asks if she had gone to police. At this point, her mother already contacted police, she testified.
“This needs to be done now before this goes any further,” McLeod said, insisting she drop a police investigation.
— With files from The Canadian Press
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