Lawyer questions woman in world juniors sex assault trial on inconsistencies in statements

E.M. has testified she didn’t pay much attention to the Hockey Canada statement in 2022 because she didn’t think it would be part of any police investigation.

Court has heard London police had closed their initial investigation in 2019 without any charges.

E.M. said she electronically signed off on the July 20, 2022, statement sometime after 9 a.m. that day.

But Savard is telling E.M. that London police Det. Lindsay Ryan (the main investigator) came to E.M.’s house at 8:44 a.m. that day to tell her, as a courtesy, that London police would be reopening the investigation – suggesting E.M. did know the police investigation was starting back up when she signed the document for Hockey Canada.

E.M. says she doesn’t recall the date and time Ryan came to tell her the police investigation would be reopened.

“I truly believe that when I signed this [Hockey Canada statement], I thought it was for a separate investigation. I didn’t know it would all be part of the same investigation eventually,” E.M. says.

“I suggest to you that every word of your explanation as to why these inaccuracies exist is false,” Savard says of the 2018 and 2022 statements.

“I don’t agree with that,” E.M. replies.

One note from Savard's cross-examination so far: Both she and Humphrey have asked E.M. to succinctly answer their questions.

E.M. has been taking a lot of runway in answering their questions, providing extra context and details not requested by the lawyers.

Savard has suggested this tendency might prolong her cross-examination, and asked E.M. to answer her questions more briefly and directly.

Savard points out details E.M. gave in the 2022 document that didn’t match the 2018 statements.

In 2022, E.M.’s statement to Hockey Canada investigators says:

• That E.M. didn’t buy any of the drinks that night.
• That she didn’t initiate any of the touching at the bar.
• That she fell down in front of McLeod.
• That she didn’t know they were hockey players and thought they were just a group of guys going to play golf the next day.

E.M. says she didn’t really know the importance of the statement in 2022. She says thought it was just part of an internal investigation and was one more thing she had to do.

Hart’s lawyer asks E.M. about the statement she signed as part of Hockey Canada’s investigation on July 20, 2022.

That statement has different details than the three statements she gave to London police in 2018.

E.M. says her lawyers wrote the 2022 document after looking over her 2018 statements.

She says she flipped through the 2022 statement before e-signing it and did not go through her earlier statements to police before doing so.

“Any errors in the July 2022 document are an error on your lawyers’ part not to catch them?” Savard asks.

“Yes, but I also didn’t catch them,” E.M. says.

Hart’s lawyer repeated a point we have heard from some of the other defence teams over the last few weeks.

They are trying to co-ordinate their cross-examination questions so they don’t go over the same ground again and again and ask the same questions of E.M. on the same matters.

Even though each defence team has to look out for its own client’s best interests, there is a strategic benefit in co-ordinating their line of questioning both in terms of making sure the trial doesn’t run over its scheduled dates and, as some defence lawyers watching this case have suggested to me, making sure they don’t appear to be “piling on” E.M.

We begin with David Humphrey, McLeod’s lawyer, saying he’s done cross-examining E.M.

“I’m satisfied that I have asked what I need to have asked,” Humphrey says.

Defence lawyers for all five of the accused have the opportunity to question the complainant after she gave her own evidence. Megan Savard, defence lawyer for Carter Hart, will start her cross-examination of the complainant today.

Humphrey and the other defence lawyers consulted with each other to limit repeating questions.

The trial for five former world junior hockey teammates accused of sexual assault resumes this morning in London, Ont., with more cross-examination of the woman complainant.

She’s identified as E.M. as her identity is protected under a standard publication ban.

A lawyer for one of the accused, Michael McLeod, suggested during his questioning yesterday that the complainant asked McLeod to call other players into a hotel room in June 2018 and later asked them to have sex.

David Humphrey also suggested the woman wanted "the night to continue" after having sex with McLeod and told him to have some of his friends come over "to have some fun" because she wanted a "wild night."

E.M. rejected that version of events and said she remembered being "very surprised" when more men walked into the room on the night in question.

McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dubé and Callan Foote have all pleaded not guilty to sexual assault. McLeod has also pleaded not guilty to a charge of being a party to the offence of sexual assault.