Hockey player Brett Howden doesn’t remember much about being in a London, Ont. hotel room in 2018, but agreed under cross-examination Monday at the Hockey Canada sexual assault trial that what he does remember seeing he believes was “100 per cent consensual.â€
Howden, a former member of the 2018 Canadian world junior championship team, has been testifying by Zoom since last Tuesday as a witness for the Crown.
The defence began cross-examining him Monday after the judge dealt a blow to the prosecution’s case by excluding a text message Howden sent to former teammate Taylor Raddysh in 2018, referring to accused player Dillon Dubé in the hotel room “smacking this girl’s ass so hard. Like, it looked like it hurt so bad.†Howden testified last week that he doesn’t remember sending the text, nor witnessing what he describes in it.Ìý
Members of the 2018 Canadian world junior championship team on the night of June 18-19, 2018: Brett Howden, second from right, Drake Batherson, top right, and Michael McLeod, bottom centre. The complainant, who has been anonymized by the Star because her identity is covered by a publication ban, is immediately left of McLeod, blurred.
Ontario Superior Court exhibitIt was the Crown’s second attempt to have the text admitted into evidence at the judge-alone trial for Dubé, Michael McLeod, Alex Formenton, Carter Hart, and Cal Foote.
While the Crown has said the text is “important†to its case, Superior Court Justice Maria Carroccia said she continues to have concerns about its accuracy given Howden’s poor memory, and that other possible explanations for the text could be that he was exaggerating about the force of the slap, or was mistaken about Dubé being involved.
“With no recollection of the events referred to in the text, effective cross-examination will be impacted,†she said.
The players were “compelled†to sit for an interview with Hockey Canada. But they weren’t told the investigator knew police wanted access to her
The players were “compelled†to sit for an interview with Hockey Canada. But they weren’t told the investigator knew police wanted access to her
The five men are accused of sexually assaulting a then-20-year-old woman in a room at the Delta Armouries hotel in the early hours of June 19, 2018. The woman had met McLeod at Jack’s Bar and returned to his hotel room, where they had consensual sex, only for multiple men to show up afterward.
The Crown has alleged that McLeod had intercourse with the complainant a second time in the hotel room’s bathroom; that Formenton separately had intercourse with the complainant in the bathroom; that McLeod, Hart, and Dubé obtained oral sex from the woman; that Dubé slapped her naked buttocks, and that Foote did the splits over her head and his genitals “grazed†her face.Ìý
Court heard some of the men came into room 209 in response to a group chat text from McLeod about a three-way, while others, like Howden, came in under the belief that there was food in the room.Ìý
Howden, who now plays for the Vegas Golden Knights and has not been accused of any wrongdoing, remembers little about the events in question due to the passage of time and being intoxicated that night. He testified he recalled seeing Hart and McLeod receive oral sex from the woman at different times in the night, after she repeatedly demanded to have sex with players. He also remembered the woman “taking†Formenton to the bathroom.Ìý
“Throughout your time in the room, you have no doubt that what you saw was 100 per cent consensual?†Hart’s lawyer, Megan Savard, asked Howden under cross-examination Monday, to which he responded: “Yeah.â€
He also confirmed under questioning by McLeod’s lawyer, David Humphrey, that he told Hockey Canada investigators in 2018 that he got the sense the complainant was embarrassed and upset, which he believed at the time was because few men were taking her up on her offers to have sex.
That included Howden, who had a girlfriend who is now his wife, and who said he was feeling uncomfortable with the woman’s demands. He also recalled in his 2018 Hockey Canada interview that he heard but didn’t see, the woman crying, which he also believed at the time was related to her feeling embarrassed.Ìý
“It was just kind of awkward seeing this stuff, her asking and having this happen,†Howden testified Monday, referring to witnessing the sexual activity.Ìý
Howden’s testimony, full of memory gaps, has posed problems for the prosecution, with Crown attorney Meaghan Cunningham acknowledging last week that the testimony of her witness has not proceeded “as anticipated.â€Ìý
The complainant, whose identity is covered by a standard publication ban, has testified about “multiple people†taking turns slapping her “as hard as they could†and that it hurt, but was unable to identify anyone.
London police documents make clear the high-profile sex assault investigation was reopened in 2022 due to “a resurgence in media attention†— with
London police documents make clear the high-profile sex assault investigation was reopened in 2022 due to “a resurgence in media attention†— with
Player Tyler Steenbergen testified earlier this month that he saw Dubé slap her, saying that “it wasn’t hard, but it didn’t seem soft either.†He then agreed with suggestions put to him under cross-examination by the defence that it appeared playful and part of foreplay. Similar to Howden, Steenbergen also recalled the woman asking the room: “Can one of you guys come over and f-‌-‌- me?’â€
The Howden text message would have been the piece of evidence most closely aligned to what the complainant has told the court about the slapping, and the Crown had been fervently trying to get it admitted at trial.Ìý
“The text message provides what I submit is very critical corroboration for the complainant’s testimony about one of the actual offences that is charged before the court,†Cunningham said during legal arguments last week. “It is also itself direct evidence of that offence.â€Ìý
While Dubé’s lawyer has told the court her client doesn’t dispute that his hand made contact with the complainant’s buttocks, Carroccia said in her ruling Monday it’s possible that others were responsible for the forceful slapping described by the complainant.Ìý
The judge also found there’s a lack of “adequate substitutes†to test the truth and accuracy of the text message, which would have included Howden making the statement under oath, or while he was being video-recorded.
