Former Flyers goalie Carter Hart found not guilty in Hockey Canada sexual assault case

Carter Hart will not face prison time after Justice Maria Carroccia found the former Flyers goaltender not guilty on the count of sexual assault.

According to media outlets present at the Ontario Superior Court house in London, Ontario, Carroccia started announcing her decision Thursday by saying: “Having found that I cannot rely upon the evidence of E.M. [the accuser] and then considering the evidence in this trial as a whole, I conclude that the Crown [plaintiff] cannot meet its onus on any of the counts before me.”

Hart, who turns 27 next month, was one of five former Canadian World Junior team players on trial for allegedly sexually assaulting a woman in 2018 after a Hockey Canada banquet in London, Ontario. The woman alleged that after having consensual sex with Michael McLeod, whom she met earlier that night at a local bar, she was sexually assaulted by McLeod and several of his teammates, including Hart, in McLeod’s hotel room over a period of hours.

Former NHLers Hart, Dillon Dubé, Cal Foote and Alex Formenton were each charged in February of last year with one count of sexual assault, while McLeod was charged with sexual assault and faced an additional charge for being “party to the offence,” or aiding a sexual assault.

All were acquitted Thursday on the presented charges. If convicted, the five players could have faced a maximum of 10 years in prison, according to Canada’s sexual assault laws.

“The accused are free to go,” Carroccia said after delivering her verdict around 3 p.m. The Crown has 30 days to appeal, but would need to find flaws in Carroccia’s process.

The acquittals come more than seven years after the initial London police case was opened in the days following the incident, and about six weeks after Carroccia oversaw a trial that ran from April 22 to June 14.

That trial featured several disturbances, including a mistrial and two jury dismissals. Staring at grounds for a second mistrial, Carroccia changed the trial from a jury trial to a judge-only trial on May 16.

Hart’s sexual assault charge stemmed from the accusation that he obtained nonconsensual oral sex from the woman on June 18, the night in question. The judge said Thursday that the Crown failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the woman did not consent to the sexual contact. Hart was the first player to hear his verdict read.

The former Flyers goalie testified during the trial that the woman asked the players to have sex with her, and that he asked for and received oral sex after she agreed.

The judge determined that the Crown was unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it was not consensual sexual touching by any of the players on trial, citing inconsistencies in the woman’s statements, her sexual aggressiveness, gaps in the woman’s memory and the fact that “some of her testimony was proven wrong when compared to the video evidence,” Carroccia said.

Before delivering the official verdicts, Carroccia on Thursday went through the evidence in the case at length for multiple hours, pointing to several inconsistencies between the statements made by the woman in 2022 to Hockey Canada and her recent testimony, as well as the nature of text messages between her and McLeod in the days that directly followed the banquet, as reasons she “cannot rely upon the evidence of E.M.”

The woman was not present in the courtroom on Thursday and instead watched and listened from a remote location.

Carroccia then discussed the two consent videos filmed by McLeod, where the woman said the sexual acts that night were consensual. The woman later testified she was drunk and did not remember recording the videos.

The judge said the woman did “not display any signs of intoxication” in the videos and had “no difficulty speaking” and was “not slurring her words, and speaks clearly and coherently.” Carroccia said the woman “exaggerated her intoxication,” and that “in this case, I have found actual consent not vitiated by fear.”

Carroccia also recounted Hart’s testimony — he was the only one of the five players to testify in his own defense — from May 29.

“The gist was Mike was with a girl back at the hotel who wanted to have sex with some of the boys,” Hart testified about a call he said he received from McLeod inviting him to his room, according to TSN, one of the media outlets present in the courtroom in May. “I was open to sexual encounters. A single guy, I was having a good time that weekend. I was open to it.”

He later testified that as many as eight players were in the room at one time but that neither he nor any of his teammates did anything to degrade or disrespect the woman, despite allegations from the woman that the players spat on, slapped and intimidated her.

“I don’t think anyone would have done anything to hurt her,” Hart said during cross-examination by the Crown’s attorney, Meaghan Cunningham, in May. “I think if something happened that she didn’t want, I would have put a stop to it. Other guys would have. I wouldn’t have stayed in the room as long as I did.”

The Alberta native acknowledged he was “pretty drunk” and that he is unable to remember everything that happened while he was in McLeod’s hotel room. His voice was also captured on video, inviting another teammate to the hotel room, which he justified by saying that the teammate was “single.”

What’s next?

Hart, who is currently a free agent after his contract expired at the end of the 2023-24 season, last appeared in a game for the Flyers on Jan. 20, 2024, before taking a leave of absence three days later. He posted a 96-93-29 career record in 227 games with the Flyers after being selected in the second round of the 2016 NHL draft.

It remains to be seen if Hart and the other players, all of whom are out of contract, will face discipline or suspensions from the NHL even after Thursday’s not guilty verdicts.

The NHL conducted a yearlong investigation in 2022, with commissioner Gary Bettman stating last February that the league would not release its findings until after the legal case was resolved.

“There is a serious judicial process that looks like it’s unfolding,” Bettman said. “And we didn’t, while we’re doing our investigation, want to interfere with what the London Police Service was doing. And we’re not going to do anything to interfere or influence the judicial proceedings. We’re all going to have to see how that plays out, and as I said in my remarks, we will then be in a position to respond appropriately, which we will do.”

At his annual media availability before the Stanley Cup Final in June, Bettman reiterated that he will not comment further until the process is fully resolved. Now that the case is over, attention will turn to Bettman and the NHL’s response.