Dubin Inquiry’s lead counsel calls for official probe into junior hockey scandals

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Is an official federal inquiry the subsequent vital step within the junior hockey scandal that has shaken Canada all the way down to its skate blades?

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And may it’s?

Many Canadians are calling for one, together with a number of indignant MPs eventually week’s newest particular committee hearings on Parliament Hill.

Robert P. (Bob) Armstrong was lead counsel in essentially the most well-known sports-related authorities probe in Canadian historical past, the Dubin Inquiry into steroid use in home sports activities. In a cellphone interview over the lengthy weekend, Armstrong stated he thinks the present sexual assault scandals in junior hockey, and the controversial administration of it by that sport’s nationwide leaders, warrant a federal inquiry.

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“I believe everyone could be inquisitive about clearing the decks on this, and attending to the underside of it,” stated the 84-year-old Armstrong, a Queen’s Counsel appointee in 1978, an Ontario Court docket of Appeals decide from 2002-13, and at the moment a resident arbitrator and mediator at Ontario-based Arbitration Place.

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“It appears to me that given it’s our nationwide sport, it’s our nationwide pastime — for a lot of, hockey is nearly a faith — I believe there could be an incredible profit to clearing the decks on this, in getting the entire story out, and on an impartial foundation.”

The Dubin Inquiry was launched solely days after Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson examined optimistic for steroids on the 1988 Summer season Olympic Video games in Seoul, South Korea, which stripped him of the blockbuster gold medal he’d received within the 100-metre sprint, in then world-record time, 9.79 seconds.

Johnson received that gold on Sept. 24. Three days later he was stripped of it, and left South Korea in shame.

Simply eight days later, on Oct. 5, 1988, the Canadian authorities launched a fee of inquiry “into the usage of medication and banned practices meant to extend athletic efficiency.”

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Charles L. Dubin, then affiliate chief justice of Ontario, was appointed commissioner of the inquiry. Armstrong oversaw the investigation and was the lead questioner at many months of hearings, which started in December 1988 and continued deep into 1989. A whole bunch of hours of these hearings aired dwell on Canadian TV.

Dubin submitted his 581-page report in 1990. Its advantages have been two-fold — first, in that it not solely acquired to the underside of the problem (steroid use not solely in Canadian sports activities however around the globe, and different manners of dishonest) in revealing issues that in any other case absolutely would by no means have come out in that period, and, two, it provided vital suggestions that have been applied and which, certainly, largely cleaned up drug dishonest in Canadian Olympic sports activities.

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In brief, the inquiry served its function, after which some.

The Canadian Ministry of Justice’s Inquiries Act, final amended in April 2005, spells out when and the way a federal inquiry could also be referred to as and carried out.

Based on the act, the Governor in Council — that’s, the Governor Normal appearing by, and with, the present federal authorities’s cupboard — “could, each time (it) deems it expedient, trigger inquiry to be made into and regarding any matter linked with the great authorities of Canada, or the conduct of any a part of the general public enterprise thereof.”

“That’s very broad,” Armstrong stated. “Within the Dubin Inquiry, all beginner sports activities have been in a way beneath the final jurisdiction of the federal authorities, in that mainly, notably within the Olympic space, they have been funded by taxpayers’ cash.

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“The problem right here, in fact, is that solely 6% of Hockey Canada is funded by the federal authorities, I take it. So anyone may say that (these hockey scandals) actually don’t come inside that broad definition of being ‘a part of the general public enterprise’ of Canada. However that stated, hockey is our nationwide sport, it’s in our DNA, actually, and there isn’t a Canadian who doesn’t acknowledge the significance of hockey within the lifetime of this nation.”

If an inquiry have been to be ordered, “it presumably could be run simply because the Dubin Inquiry was run,” Armstrong stated.

Per the act, multiple commissioner could also be named to supervise it. Such commissioners “have the facility of summoning earlier than them any witnesses, and of requiring them to (a) give proof, orally or in writing, and on oath (or) on solemn affirmation; and produce such paperwork and issues because the commissioners deem requisite to the total investigation of the issues into which they’re appointed to look at.”

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Inquiry commissioners “have the identical energy” to compel full and trustworthy testimony of witnesses “as is vested in any courtroom of document in civil circumstances.” That features issuing “a subpoena or different request or summons, requiring and commanding” any witness to (a) seem when referred to as, (b) to “testify to all issues inside his data relative to the subject material of an investigation, (c) “to convey and produce any doc, e book or paper that the particular person has in his possession, or beneath his relative management, relative to the subject material of the investigation.”

Witnesses are permitted to be represented by a lawyer, and could also be reimbursed for “cheap journey bills.” Any witnesses who fail to attend or cooperate “with out legitimate excuse,” or who refuse “to supply any doc, e book or paper in his possession or beneath his management,” or who refuses to be sworn in or to affirm, or who refuses to “reply any correct query put to him” whereas giving testimony “is liable, on abstract conviction … to a advantageous not exceeding $400.”

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One of the crucial beautiful points of the Dubin Inquiry was, by and huge, how trustworthy all of the cheaters Armstrong referred to as to testify. Again and again, they spilled all of it — how they cheated, why they cheated, the character of drug-cheating all the way down to the best particulars, and so forth. At the beginning was Johnson’s private monitor coach — and essentially the most highly effective one in Canada on the time — Charlie Francis.

Sprinter Angella Issajenko additionally shocked the nation, again and again, along with her frank revelations.

What compelled such honesty? Certainly not the specter of a $400 advantageous for mendacity, beneath phrases of the Inquiries Act, or regardless of the paltry quantity have been then. (That stated, it have to be identified it’s a violation of the Felony Code of Canada to commit perjury “with the intent to mislead” whereas beneath oath, or solemn declaration. Which means anybody caught mendacity whereas testifying at a federal inquiry would wind up with a prison document.)

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“Charlie Francis determined he was going to inform the reality,” Armstrong stated. “He knew he was going to be beneath oath. He was our No. 1 witness. After which Angella Issajenko stored a private diary of all of the instances she took (the steroid) Stanazolol or any drug of any variety. It was a day by day (document). They have been our first two (monitor and discipline) witnesses.”

Earlier on the inquiry, dishonest Canadian weightlifters described how that they had used syringes to insert drug-free urine into their bladders.

Thus, a excessive bar of honesty was set for all subsequent Dubin Inquiry witnesses.

“It wasn’t something intelligent that we did as legal professionals,” Armstrong stated. “They determined it was time to inform the world what was happening. They’d actually been caught point-blank, so there was little doubt they’d had the drug of their programs.

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“Ben (Johnson) did have some form of preliminary excuse, but it surely was very flimsy. Charlie and Angella determined they have been going to inform the reality. Then Ben, who was individually represented, modified his thoughts and he in actual fact laid all of it out, too.”

How would a hockey-scandal inquiry proceed on the get-go? “The very first thing,” Armstrong stated, “is defining what the character of the issue is, after which taking recommendation from the specialists, and others, as to what ought to be accomplished to unravel the issue — if there’s a downside.

“They might discover on the finish of the day that there actually isn’t an issue. I don’t know. I’m not within the enterprise of creating a pre-judgment on one thing simply on the idea of occasional stuff that seems within the public media, earlier than everybody concerned has a chance to have their say.”

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Within the case of the present hockey scandals, a selected focus, or focuses, could be integral.

For example, would a federal inquiry examine merely the intercourse scandals themselves — the reported allegations in opposition to quite a few gamers from each of Canada’s in any other case beloved World Junior hockey groups of 2003 and 2018?

Or would it not probe all poisonous components of junior hockey itself?

Or the appalling selections made by hockey’s highest leaders — of their non-profit enterprise that rakes in tens of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} per yr in income — to cowl up the entire above, over so a few years?

Or each dang little bit of it?

No matter scope a federal inquiry into hockey is likely to be charged with, investigators backed, and empowered, by such an esteemed inquiry would start it.

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“We had a crew of investigators that went out and, to begin with, did a really thorough investigation, interviewing folks and so forth. And so they have been capable of cross on the data to us and we, as (lead inquiry) legal professionals, adopted that up and did our personal interviewing and investigating of these we thought we wished to name as witnesses. In order that’s the way in which it really works.

“There’s public funding obtainable to help in all that.”

Ultimately week’s particular parliamentary hearings, a number of MPs have been mightily labored up over the hockey scandals.

“You recognize, hockey is Canada’s sport,” Conservative MP Kevin Waugh stated. “It’s been in everyone’s yard. This hits deeply. I stand by my earlier feedback, not solely Hockey Canada, however yesterday I referred to as on Sport Canada too. We’ve got to explode Sport Canada as a lot as (some) wish to blow up Hockey Canada. It’s a tradition that we all know, on this nation, has gone on too lengthy. We’ve all agreed with that. However there’s heavy lifting to do … We want this. We want a cleaning in hockey, we’d like a cleaning in sport.

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“We haven’t acquired all of the solutions.”

Liberal MP Anthony Housefather instructed hockey leaders: “There must be a much bigger cultural change in Hockey Canada than you’re at the moment promising right this moment … The general public has misplaced confidence in (you).”

NDP MP Peter Julian stated the allegations of gang sexual violence contained within the 2018 sufferer’s assertion “are profoundly disturbing,” as is rising proof “across the allegations of a vicious sexual assault in 2003 … a full vary of bodily and sexual abuse. You, because the stewards of our nationwide sport, have been accountable throughout these durations, and your organizations are answerable for placing an finish to the abuses that we’re seeing.”

Maybe it comes all the way down to this: Do sufficient Canadians belief those self same leaders who’ve overseen or commissioned the coverups and hush funds, and who allowed essentially the most disturbing and abhorrent components of Canadian junior-hockey he-man tradition to proceed for many years, even generations, imagine they’re those who ought to writer the suitable, lasting fixes — as these very leaders are arguing and intending?

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If the Liberal cupboard — composed of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his high ministers, particularly Minister of Justice and Legal professional Normal of Canada David Lametti — believes the reply is not any, then in all probability there must be a federal inquiry launched, ASAP.

It’s basically the cupboard’s choice to make.

“I’m in no place to cross judgment on that call,” Armstrong stated. “But when (they proceed then) whoever they’d appoint as commissioner, or commissioners, hopefully would transfer promptly.”

John Kryk now writes a weekly publication on NFL issues. Content material is unique to that platform. You’ll be able to have it robotically dropped into your e-mail inbox on Wednesdays just by signing up — without cost — at https://torontosun.com/newsletters/

JoKryk@postmedia.com

@JohnKryk