3 Stories You Missed 04/02/25

WARNING: This article is NSFW and contains descriptions of sexual assault.

A woman, who is only known as “Jane Doe” to the public, has filed a lawsuit against four former Windsor Spitfires players. We do not know the names of the four players accused. We only know that they are accused of committing sexual assault during a house party in April 1984. The woman is represented by Rob Talach, the same man representing the woman who has accused eight players from the 2018 Canada World Junior Championship team of sexual assault.

According to Jane Doe, she went to a party at the billet home of a Spitfires player at age 20 or 21 (I don’t know the month of her birth) and remembers almost nothing of what happened. She drank little alcohol, but woke up in one of the bedrooms in the house, on the bed, unclothed, unable to move, being raped by four players. A fifth player was in the room, but it’s unknown whether he raped her or not.

The lawsuit also alleges that the OHL was negligent by ignoring systemic abuse in the league, discouraging reports of sexual assault, and condoning the degradation and sexual exploitation of women. It also states that Jane Doe “has been required to undergo medical treatment and psychological counselling and will continue to require [the] same indefinitely throughout her lifetime.”

Jane Doe had this to say to reporters about the lawsuit: “I could have not reported and said, ‘Well, I'm just going to have to get some therapy and deal with it on my own’. But I feel that these people need to be held accountable. And it's not, it's not just the players, right? It's the whole system. Something needs to change. The disruption those have caused you can't imagine. I can't even describe it, except to say I cannot function sexually, so it's caused a huge problem in our marriage.”

Nicolas Daigle and Massimo Siciliano are heading to prison. These two once played for the Victoriaville Tigres in the QMJHL. In 2023, they pleaded guilty to sexual assault of a minor. After that, Daigle was given a 32-month jail sentence while Siciliano was given 30 months. They assaulted the victim while celebrating a championship victory at a hotel in June 2021. The victim was an employee at the hotel and agreed to meet Daigle in his room, alone. But, when she arrived, Siciliano was there as well, and both he and Daigle raped her.

The OHL has hired Turnpenney Milne LLP to conduct a “cultural review” of the Niagara IceDogs. Turnpenney Milne LLP is a law firm that focuses on workplace law. The reason they’ve been hired to do an investigation is due to some recent complaints of inappropriate behavior by IceDogs staff. The OHL also appointed the league director of player recruitment and player support services, Brodie Barrick, to work with the IceDogs organization during the investigation. What the alleged misconduct complaints are, we do not know. The OHL declined to make the allegations public. All they have said is that they are not criminal or sexual in nature.

This investigation into the IceDogs just a few years after a previous investigation, also conducted by Turnpenney Milne LLP, into an inappropriate WhatsApp chat. General manager Joey Burke and head coach Billy Burke were indefinitely suspended while Burke and the team were fined. The Burke’s, who also owned the team, sold it shortly after.

In 2023, the team was stripped of a first-round pick and fined. In addition, general manager and new team owner, Darren DeDobbelaer, was suspended for two years and players Joshua Rosenzweig and Landon Cato were banned by the league for bullying.

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