Four Canadian hockey players to remain suspended by Hockey Canada after acquittal
An independent appeals board of Hockey Canada ruled on Wednesday that four Canadian ice hockey players should remain suspended from Hockey Canada-sanctioned programmes after they were acquitted of sexual assault in July 2025. The board recommended that four of the five acquitted players stay barred from representing Canada at international level while the fifth, Alex Formenton, was deemed to have breached conduct rules but is being reinstated.
The five men — Michael McLeod, Dillon Dube, Cal Foote, Carter Hart and Formenton — are former members of Canada’s under-20s junior hockey team and were accused of sexual assault over an incident in 2018. They were found not guilty in July 2025 when Justice Maria Carroccia said she did not find EM’s evidence "credible or reliable". The appeals board’s decision was based on breaches of Hockey Canada’s code of conduct rather than the criminal verdict.
Formenton is eligible for immediate reinstatement by Hockey Canada, the ruling said, while Foote will be eligible on 10 November of this year. Hart and Dube will be eligible on 10 November 2027 and 10 November 2028 respectively, and McLeod on 10 November 2030. Officials did not say why the reinstatement dates differed for each player.
The ruling does not affect the players’ eligibility to play in the National Hockey League, which operates independently of Hockey Canada. All five were allowed by the NHL to sign contracts again for league teams late last year, and the NHL conducted its own investigation into the incident at the centre of the legal case.
The court heard that the woman, known as EM, had met the players at a bar and later went back to a hotel room in London, Ontario, during a gala in 2018. Evidence presented at trial included that she went to the room to have consensual sex with McLeod and that other players entered the room and engaged in further sexual acts; the central issue was whether EM, who was 20 at the time, had consented to every sexual act that night.
Lawyers for the players argued that EM asked the men to have sex and that the men believed she gave consent. EM testified that she was intoxicated and felt fearful of the men, saying she had initially agreed to have sex with McLeod but did not agree to what unfolded afterwards.
Canada’s secretary of sport, Adam van Koeverden, said after the appeals board ruling: "This case started a national conversation about safe sport and the problematic culture in men's hockey." He added: "It is the voices of women and survivors, and the courage and bravery it takes to come forward, that have led to changes we are seeing in toxic culture." Van Koeverden said there has been progress at Hockey Canada to "address long-standing systemic failures" and said that national sport organisations must be held accountable.
While Formenton can be reinstated immediately by Hockey Canada, the other four players must wait until the staggered reinstatement dates set by the board before they may return to international competition.