HUNTER: Team Canada group sex trial is, uh, complicated

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Reasonable doubt is the oldest tool in the defence lawyer’s toolbox.

And the legal eagles representing five former members of the 2018 Team Canada Junior squad have mercilessly employed that tool.

For seven days in a London courtroom, a young woman detailed a harrowing evening where she was allegedly passed around for sex with five hockey players. Treated like a “porn star”, she said.

The players — Michael McLeod, Dillon Dube, Alex Formenton, Carter Hart and Callan Foote — are now on trial for the June 19, 2018, alleged sexual assault. They have all have pleaded not guilty.

Earlier, the team was celebrating their world championship victory at a London watering hole following a Hockey Canada gala and golf tournament. The complainant, known as E.M., hooked up with Michael McLeod, 27, on the dance floor.

She admitted the pair had consensual sex in his room at the Delta Armouries Hotel. The woman alleged that McLeod then invited teammates to his room for sex with his new friend.

After that moment, things become very opaque indeed. Consent remains the key word here.

Did the woman ask McLeod to invite other players to his room for a sexual free-for-all, or was she trapped and terrified and only went along with the sex out of fear?

“This case demonstrates that allegations are exactly that, mere allegations,” respected criminal lawyer Monte MacGregor told the Toronto Sun.

MacGregor does not represent the alleged victim or any of the accused.

“It requires a thorough analysis of all the evidence with the proper degree of scrutiny to assess whether someone is actually guilty,” he said, adding it’s clear why cops may have initially been reluctant to proceed.

“When you defend a sexual assault, it either didn’t happen or it was consensual. And the defendant, in arguing that it was consensual, has the burden of showing that they acted in a way to obtain the consent.

“The question becomes: Did they have an honest but mistaken belief in consent? If you had someone videotaped where they orally pronounced their consent on multiple occasions with a clear, lucid voice and checked in on them regularly to confirm everything that was occurring was with their consent, how would you take those answers?”

He added: “How would the accused have taken those words and actions that may have demonstrated overt, active and voluntary participation by the complainant?”

E.M. has consistently said she was drunk, and there is much she doesn’t remember about that night in 2018. She has doubled down on explaining that during the alleged sex assaults, she separated her mind from her body.

“Was the alleged victim’s active participation clear and concise, and was anyone too intoxicated to consent?” the lawyer said.

MacGregor said the jury must also decide whether E.M. had a motive in making the allegations such as “a scenario where the  boyfriend at that time [who became a fiancé] may not have stayed in the relationship if this actually was fully voluntary.”

MacGregor said it was important for the public to realize that while the allegations may “sound heinous, abusive and appear overwhelming at the outset, they can have a monumental downturn.”

And what of reasonable doubt?

MacGregor said that, unlike most cases, every minute of the prosecution is being reported and the public can see the evidence the accused are putting forward in an effort to create a reasonable doubt.

MacGregor said the lawyers for the accused have tried to point to alleged inconsistencies in E.M.’s statements and suggested she was motivated by an agenda. He also said the video where E.M. is alleged to have voluntarily consented could be “crucial” to the jury’s decision as to whether there was reasonable doubt.

Still, the young NHL stars will have most likely seen their careers flushed down the toilet, win, lose or draw. And no matter how you cut it, their fates are in the hands of the 12 jurors.

“What is a scary possibility is that a conviction remains possible despite the nature of the narrative that is emerging before the court,” the lawyer said.

bhunter@postmedia.com

@HunterTOSun