Formenton, Dube police interviews played at London hockey trial

Content advisory: This article includes graphic language and details of alleged sexual assault

During separate interviews with a police investigator in late 2018, Alex Formenton and Dillon Dube shared their perspectives about what happened in a hotel room in London, Ont., the night of an alleged sexual assault in June 2018, saying that a number of their teammates stood and watched as E.M. engaged in sex acts with several different men.

On Wednesday, the trial of Formenton, Dube, and three of their former teammates on Canada’s 2018 world junior hockey team reviewed 2018 police interviews in which Formenton and Dube were interviewed by London Police Service sergeant Stephen Newton.

Newton, who is now retired, was the lead investigator in the case after E.M., the complainant in the case whose identity is protected by a publication ban, initially contacted police. He closed the case without laying charges in early 2019.

Newton conducted the in-person interview of Formenton in London on Nov. 24, 2018. He spoke to Dube on the phone on Dec. 18, 2018. Both of the players were represented by Toronto lawyer Lou Strezos, who has since been appointed an Ontario Superior Court judge.

Formenton, Dube, Michael McLeod, Callan Foote and Carter Hart are accused of sexually assaulting E.M. in McLeod’s hotel room during the early morning hours of June 19, 2018, following a night of dancing and drinking at a downtown London bar. McLeod faces a second charge of being party to the offence. All of the defendants have pleaded not guilty.

The Crown has alleged that Formenton had sex with E.M. in the bathroom, that McLeod, Hart and Dube received oral sex from the complainant, that Dube slapped E.M.’s naked buttocks, that Foote did the splits over E.M.’s head and “grazed” his genitals over her head, and that McLeod had sex with E.M. for a second time in the hotel room bathroom.

Both Formenton and Dube told Newton that after a Hockey Canada event during which players received rings to celebrate their world junior championship, players went out to party at Jack’s bar in downtown London. Formenton and Robert Thomas, who were 18 at the time, were not allowed in Jack’s and instead joined some Team Canada coaches at Joe Kool’s, another downtown bar, where Formenton drank a beer and two rum and Cokes, Formenton told Newton.

After spending 90 minutes with his coaches, Formenton received a text message from McLeod, his roommate at the Delta Armouries Hotel in London, saying that he had a girl in the room who wanted to have a threesome, Formenton told Newton.

Formenton responded to McLeod that he’d be back to the hotel soon.

“So, in your mind, when Mr. McLeod is saying this, what is in your mind? What are you thinking is going to happen when you get back to the hotel?” Newton asked.

“I just assumed that this girl wanted to have a threesome with me and Mikey McLeod,” Formenton answered, adding that he believed at the time that McLeod had only messaged him the invitation to have group sex.

Formenton told Newton he could not provide the text messages with McLeod because he had a new phone.

After he returned to the hotel, Formenton told Newton that he walked into Room 209 with Hart and Robert Thomas, and that Thomas left after about five minutes. Formenton said that McLeod, Jake Bean, and Dube were in the room and that E.M. was sitting clothed on one of the beds.

“She seemed pretty happy, I mean she was talking to the guys,” Formenton told Newton.

Formenton told the officer that he watched as Hart pulled down his pants and received oral sex from E.M. for about five minutes. At that point, she stopped and went into the bathroom, before emerging fully naked and resuming oral sex on Hart for another five minutes.

At that point, Formenton told Newton that E.M. said, “’Is anyone going to bang me?’”

“I volunteered, but I honestly didn’t want to do it in front of guys,” Formenton said. “I found that very awkward and weird, so we both walked into the washroom.”

Formenton said he put on a condom and had sex with E.M. in the bathroom for about five minutes before he took off the condom and received oral sex until he ejaculated in E.M.’s mouth. At that point, Formenton said E.M. left the bathroom and he got into the shower for 15 minutes and got ready for bed.

When Formenton came out of the bathroom, he told Newton that E.M. was giving oral sex to Hart again.

“And what are the guys doing in the room at the time?” Newton asked.

“They were just sitting there watching,” Formenton answered.

After she gave oral sex to Hart for five minutes, E.M. moved on to Dube, Formenton said.

E.M. then gave Dube oral sex before she took a break for about three minutes and then “started crawling up onto the bed where McLeod was laying” and gave him oral sex, Formenton said.

“What happens after that?” Newton asked Formenton in their interview.

“She was on all fours on the floor of the hotel room saying, ‘Is anyone going to do anything to me?’ and that’s at the point she was playing with herself and saying, ‘Is anyone going to bang me? Like, this is embarrassing that you have a naked girl in front of you and… no one’s going to do anything.’”

Formenton said that after 10 minutes, players began leaving the room and E.M. began to put her clothes on. Formenton said that at that point, he saw E.M. follow McLeod into the bathroom before they both emerged after about 10 minutes.

That was when Formenton said he saw McLeod film a consent video.

Formenton did not tell Newton that he saw Dube slap E.M. While Formenton told a Hockey Canada investigator in 2022 that he did see Dube slap her, that evidence was ruled inadmissible during pretrial hearings because a judge ruled the statements three players gave to Hockey Canada in 2022 were coerced.

Dube told Newton in a December of 2018 interview that after returning from a night of dancing and drinking with his teammates on June 18, 2018, he received a text message from Jake Bean saying that there was pizza in McLeod’s hotel room.

“Right when I walked into the room, there’s a girl laying on the floor, naked,” Dube told Newton.

Dube said that E.M. then began to put her clothes on.

“She said, ‘Well, I’m putting my clothes on because no one will bang me and you guys are p-----s, like kind of saying that hockey guys would do that and want to do that,” Dube said. “And then, I remember Carter Hart was, like, ‘Okay, I guess I’ll do something, I want to.’ So she started taking her clothes off.”

Dube did not tell Newton in December 2018 that he slapped E.M. Brett Howden told Hockey Canada investigators in 2022 that he remembered seeing Dube smack E.M. and previously during the trial, Tyler Steenbergen testified that he saw Dube slap E.M. and that it “wasn’t hard, but it didn’t seem soft either.”

Dube’s lawyer, Lisa Carnelos, previously told the court that Dube would not dispute that he put his hands on E.M.’s buttocks in the physical manner described by Steenbergen.

Dube told Newton that he watched “Hartsy” receive oral sex for five to 10 minutes.

“And then at one point I stood up and thought I might as well, and then I remember I pulled my pants down and she came up to me and she gave me oral… I’d say for 10 seconds, maybe,” Dube said.

(Formenton told Newton that Dube received oral sex for about 10 minutes.)

“And then I kind of knew it was a bad idea, and I didn’t want to be a part of it,” Dube told Newton. “So I kind of stumbled back and kind of rolled over in between the middle of the bed.”

Dube told Newton that he was holding a golf club while he received oral sex. E.M. has alleged that she felt afraid after players began saying she should put golf balls in her vagina and asked if she “could take” an entire golf club inside her. Dube told Newton he did not hear anyone make those comments.

Dube said that after he had rolled onto the ground, he asked Foote to help him put his pants back on and get up off the floor. Dube then said he left McLeod’s hotel room with Foote and Sam Steel.

Newton asked Dube if there was any point during the evening when it looked like E.M. was involved in sexual acts against her will.

“No, I think at that point I was almost even, like, she was coming at us almost,” Dube said. “I feel like she was chirping us for not doing anything with her, which I thought was weird… I feel like it falls on me, too. I feel bad. I’m captain and I feel like if I was in that situation and things were different and really bad, I probably would’ve controlled the guys and kind of kicked guys out, but I didn’t think anything of it at that time, because I didn’t think that she was drunk, or against her will in any means.”

Newton was also asked on Wednesday about his initial investigation into the alleged sexual assault.

He told Crown attorney Meaghan Cunningham that he interviewed four of the members of Canada’s 2018 world junior hockey team. He said that lawyers for some of the players did not respond to his requests for cooperation.

Newton also testified that even though he obtained surveillance video from Jack’s bar, he never reviewed the video. He also said that even though he obtained E.M.’s clothing from the night of the alleged sexual assault, he never sent that clothing to experts for forensic testing.

Newton testified that he did not secure any search or production orders as part of his investigation, and was never aware of a June 26, 2018, group chat involving players connected to the alleged incident.

He also testified he never became aware during his investigation of a text message sent by McLeod to his teammates in the early morning hours of June 19, 2018, inviting them to take part in a “3 way” in his hotel room. He also never obtained a text message from Bean to Dube saying there was food in McLeod’s hotel room.

During cross-examination on Wednesday afternoon, Newton agreed that he was primarily focused with determining whether E.M. was so intoxicated during the evening of June 18, 2018, that she would have lacked the capacity to consent.

Newton told Formenton’s lawyer, Daniel Brown, that he had reviewed video of E.M. entering and departing the Delta Armouries hotel and that he believed that video was more helpful to his investigation than that surveillance video from Jack’s would have been.  

“Were you being lazy with this case?” Brown asked.

“I don’t feel I was,” Newton answered.

Brown asked if Newton was surprised that any players agreed to interviews with him in 2018, since they were not required to do so.

“It was surprising,” Newton said. “I’m happy they did, that some of them came to talk to me.”

Newton said that by the time he interviewed the players he had already made his assessment of the case and was speaking with them “just to get their side of the event and round it out and just to complete the investigation.”

Newton also agreed with McLeod’s lawyer, David Humphrey, that after hearing from Formenton that McLeod had allegedly texted him about having group sex with a girl, Newton never contacted Humphrey to ask for a follow-up interview with McLeod or to ask McLeod to check his phone or devices for those messages.

At the end of the day, Cunningham said there were some “late-breaking events” and that she may call another witness in the case.

Justice Maria Carroccia told Cunningham she could advise the court on Thursday morning if that is the case.