The London courthouse in London, Ont., is shown on April 30.Nicole Osborne/The Canadian Press
The woman who alleges that five members of Canada’s 2018 world junior hockey team sexually assaulted her in a downtown hotel in London, Ont., said she felt afraid of what would happen if she didn’t perform sexual acts on the men.
The complainant, known publicly as E.M., told the court at the players’ trial on Monday that after a night of drinking and dancing at a London bar in June, 2018, she left with one of the accused players — Michael McLeod — and had consensual sex with him in his hotel room.
But after they finished, E.M. said, he disappeared. And while she was still naked on the bed, other men, who she later learned were his teammates, began coming into the room. Their arrival “shocked” her, she told the court.
When they told her to lie down on the hotel room floor, she said, she felt she had no choice but to comply. After she expressed concern about the floor being dirty, she said, someone put down a bed sheet. Once she was on the ground, they instructed her to perform sexual acts on them, she alleged.
“I felt really uncomfortable. I was already naked and drunk and feeling really vulnerable at that point. I didn’t understand why the one man I left with had kind of disappeared and left me in that situation,” she said. “I was just scared and confused.”
E.M.’s testimony on Monday was the first time the now 27-year-old has publicly spoken about the alleged assaults that occurred in the early morning hours of June 19, 2018.
E.M. recounted details from the night of the alleged group sexual assault and the days after, when the police became involved. Court heard that on June 20 Mr. McLeod began texting her, demanding that she make a police investigation “go away.”
Mr. McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dubé and Cal Foote are each accused of sexually assaulting E.M. Mr. McLeod faces a second charge of being a party to sexual assault.
Each has pleaded not guilty.
Under questioning from Crown attorney Meaghan Cunningham, E.M. told the court that when she was lying on the hotel floor, she noticed a set of golf clubs in the room.
“I remember them making comments about putting golf balls in me, in my vagina, and asking if I could take the whole club, fit the whole golf club in me,” E.M. said. She said her automatic reaction was to laugh at this suggestion, and “brush it off” so that the players would move on.
It was at this point, she told the court, that she felt like her mind and body separated. She said started to feel “as if my mind kind of floated to the top corner of the ceiling” and that she watched herself over the ensuing hours.
E.M. told the court that at the time she was 20 years old and a people pleaser, standing about 5-foot-4 and weighing around 120 pounds. As she laid on the bed sheet, she said, the players towered around her.
She alleged that the players instructed her to touch herself and moan for them. The players then began asking for oral sex, she testified.
“They just started putting penises in my face,” she said.
The players were primarily talking to each other “encouraging each other,” E.M. testified. At times, they seemed to be making fun of her, she alleged.
“They were laughing at me. They were spitting on me at points,” she said. “It just seemed like a joke to them.”
While she was lying on the sheet, E.M. alleged, one player did the splits over top of her, touching his penis to her face. She said she “didn’t know that was going to happen.”
E.M. testified that she wasn’t sure who did it, as she couldn’t see his face, and that it “felt degrading.” (The Crown previously told the court that this player was Mr. Foote.)
At other times, players spanked her, she told the court. In another instance, she said, the players wanted her to have sex with one of the men in the bathroom.
“I got up and he followed me to the bathroom,” she said.
E.M. told the court that she was sometimes crying and attempted to leave the hotel room. But when this happened, she said, someone would “put their arm around me and guide me back to the bed sheet.”
During her testimony, the Crown asked E.M. about two short videos that were shot in the hotel room in which she says “it was all consensual” and that she “enjoyed it.”
E.M. told the court that she doesn’t remember either video being shot, but that she would have just been saying what she felt they were coaxing her to say. The words she can be heard saying in the video are not “a reflection” of how she felt in the moment, she testified.
“I think he knew it wasn’t consensual. I was crying at points. I was trying to leave at points.”
A little before 5 a.m., E.M. exited the hotel room and called an Uber to head home. As she waited, she told the court she was crying in the lobby and phoned a friend for support.
“I think I was just putting a lot of blame on myself for having even gone to the hotel in the first place. I just felt like I wish I could have reacted in a different way. I don’t know why I responded the way I did,” she said. “Just a lot of shame and embarrassment.”
Toward the end of her testimony, E.M. was asked about a text message exchange she had with Mr. McLeod a day after the alleged attack. Court heard that Mr. McLeod found her on Instagram and told her to call him. She didn’t want to talk to him, but they texted, E.M. said.
“Did you go to the police after Sunday?” he texted, according to the messages that were presented in court. E.M. replied that she believed her mom had gone to the police, but she told her not to. E.M. told the court on Monday that she is a conflict-averse person and just wanted Mr. McLeod to stop messaging her.
Mr. McLeod told her “I understand that you are embarrassed about what happened. But you need to talk to your mother right now and straighten things out with the police before this goes to [sic] far. This is a serious matter that she is misrepresenting and could have significant implications for a lot of people including you.”
Mr. McLeod‘s lawyer, David Humphrey, began the defence’s cross-examination Monday afternoon, after E.M. finished her initial statement.
During the start of the cross-examination, court heard that E.M. had a boyfriend at the time of the alleged assaults. He asked her if part of the reason that she was upset was that she had cheated on her boyfriend.
E.M. replied that she did feel guilty — she cared about him — but that the relationship was new and she was “honest” with him about what had happened.
The cross-examination continues Tuesday.
Jennifer Dunn, executive director of the London Abused Women’s Centre, outside London's Ontario Superior Court, where five members of the winning 2018 world junior hockey team are on trial for sexual assault.Robyn Doolittle/The Globe and Mail
On Monday morning, about 20 women gathered outside the courthouse holding signs that showed support for E.M.
Jennifer Dunn, the executive director of the London Abused Women’s Centre, said they plan to attend all week.
“I think the most important thing, really, is that E.M. knows that we are here and that we are supporting her,” she said. “Also, we want survivors everywhere to know that they are not alone.”