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Friday, February 5, 2016

Jian Ghomeshi Trial Update Day 4


Faced with violent tale, Ghomeshi defence reveals a literal walk in the park: DiManno

Thursday's accuser said Jian Ghomeshi could be charming — when he wasn’t smacking her in the face.

Jian Ghomeshi leaves a Toronto court with his legal team after day three of his trial on Thursday, February 4, 2016.
Chris Young / THE CANADIAN PRESS
Jian Ghomeshi leaves a Toronto court with his legal team after day three of his trial on Thursday, February 4, 2016.
Narcissist. Swellhead. Egomaniac. Prima donna. Fetishist.
None of these are legal terms so I don’t have to use the “alleged” qualifier in describing Jian Ghomeshi, to avoid libel.
A dim-wattage celebrity, beyond the navel-gazing orbit of CBC personalities.
Admission: I’d never heard of Ghomeshi until his self-penned alternate-lifestyle Facebook posting — the consensual bondage stuff — went viral as pre-emptive swipe at the employer he feared might fire him over BDSM tastes. Which Mother Corp. did, subsequently. But I don’t move in Can-Cult circles. Don’t attend entertainment industry parties. Don’t hang out at the bars CBC “glitterati” frequent.
What a small and insular world that is.
Actress-producer Lucy DeCoutere wasn’t up on the Ghomeshi File either, apparently, when first she met the CBC host at a 2003 TV conference in Banff. Actually at a karaoke contest, briefly, then a barbecue which was “a big mixer” event. “He asked if I was American, I think because I did not know a lot about his work at that point,” DeCoutere told court Thursday, taking the stand as the second accuser against Ghomeshi at his sexual assault trial. “The fact he asked me if I was American made me feel maybe I should have known a little bit more about him.”
While his vanity may have been bruised, Ghomeshi certainly seemed intrigued by the attractive and cheerful DeCoutere — best known, in the years since, for her role in Trailer Park Boys, though she’s now a training and development officer as captain in the Royal Canadian Air Force. “Extremely friendly, with flirtatious undertones that were a bit cheeky,” DeCoutere said of their BBQ conversation.
He gave her his business card. “I was flattered that he wanted to stay in touch.”

In the following weeks they communicated mostly by email, she in Halifax, he in Toronto. “I thought he was cute and interesting,” DeCoutere — the only complainant (from among three in this trial) who has waived the right to a publication ban on her name — told Crown attorney Corie Langdon. “I wanted to explore his personality a little more, to see if he was somebody I might want to spend more time with.”
The email exchange was occasionally lewd. “Anyone who knows me knows I have a sense of humour that falls into the bawdy scale . . . banter that’s a little bit lascivious and cheeky.”
As a witness awaiting her turn on the stand, DeCoutere had been warned by the prosecution not to follow reports about this trial, in either mainstream or social media. So I won’t say that she was aware of what had befallen the first complainant who testified earlier this week, caught flat-footed by the coy emails (one with a bikini pic attached) she’d sent to Ghomeshi after the night he’d allegedly punched her three times in the head. But under direct questioning, DeCoutere put the content of those emails on the record, presumably before defence lawyer Marie Henein had the opportunity to pounce.
Thus we heard about “Rusty Trombone” — a sex act the witness said was mentioned as a joke. She added: “In this environment I’m feeling it’s not so funny, but at the time it was.”
Ghomeshi suggested phone sex; DeCoutere said no.
But by July, a month after Banff, she was in Toronto, partly to see friends and partly to explore the “potential” of a romantic relationship with Ghomeshi.
They met for dinner on the Friday night at Pan, a Danforth restaurant. He was annoyed that she didn’t eat cheese. “If I didn’t like spicy food either, that would be a deal-breaker.”
Ghomeshi, as the witness recalls it, wanted to quash some rumours, in case they’d reached DeCoutere’s ears: He was not gay and he had never been funded by the PLO. Mostly he was keen on talking about his career successes and impressing her with his celeb status: That he’d picked Pan because everyone knew him and the restaurant had even put on extra staff when it was learned he was coming that night; that, in younger and poorer days he’d dreamed about having the money to dine at Pan.
“He got angry at me during dinner because I didn’t show more interest in his career.”
Afterwards they went to his Riverdale home, so Ghomeshi could get a sweater and they’d take a walk. DeCoutere had no concerns. “It’s not like he was gonna kill me if we go back to his house. Lots of people had seen us (together). I knew there was a chance that he might want to be intimate but I knew that would only go to a certain point because I had no interest in having sex with him.”
They did kiss. And big deal to that. During a tour of the residence, he presented his walk-in closet — showoff-y. She noticed all the shirts were hung according to range of colours. “It was, like, perfect.”
Abruptly: “He started kissing me. Then he took me by the throat, pushed me up against the wall, cutting off my breath and choking me. There was no build-up, it was like suddenly. The way I remember it, he hit me a couple of times.”
And just stared at her afterwards, neither saying anything.
The open-mouth kissing was consensual, DeCoutere acknowledged. The rest of it, no way. “I was not able to consent to the choking or slapping. I was just receiving it.
“A thumb on one side, his palm on the front of my throat and his fingers on the other side of my throat . . . hard enough that I couldn’t breathe.”
Slap-slap. Pause. Slap.
“Hard enough that it got my attention. Not hard enough to leave a mark. It’s pretty shocking when someone slaps your face. I’ve never really had that happen before.”
Yet they didn’t speak of it. DeCoutere stayed for a while longer. “I didn’t want to be rude, which I know sounds weird after what had just happened to me. It’s a ridiculous concern.”
There was more smooching and a kiss goodnight. She wondered if the alleged attack had somehow been her fault, “because of my pleasing personality.” And, well, “everybody makes gaffes.” Further: “I kind of had compassion for him. But he didn’t have compassion for me . . . Also, I wasn’t in a relationship (with him) so was this intimate-partner violence? I didn’t know how to process it.”
Despite the alleged assault, DeCoutere (with a mutual friend) met Ghomeshi the following day at a Danforth patio for brunch, went to an art show. At some point that weekend there was a walk in the park, though DeCoutere had no memory of that until defence lawyer Marie Henein, during cross-examination, produced photographs taken of them, cuddling up.
On the Sunday, Ghomeshi took her to a barbecue. But first, when DeCoutere came by the house to hook up with him, she accidentally stepped on Ghomeshi’s glasses, breaking them. “He was on the verge of tears.” Later, Ghomeshi fell into a grumpy mood because DeCoutere declined to accompany him on what sounded very much like a late date with another woman.
DeCoutere returned to Halifax on the Monday and sent Ghomeshi flowers.
“I knew I didn’t want to have a romantic relationship with Mr. Ghomeshi. I did want to stay in touch with him.”
Charismatic, DeCoutere described Ghomeshi, charming — when he wasn’t smacking her in the face.
Full of himself, though.
“Nobody loves Jian more than Jian.”
A year later, back in Banff, they were on the karaoke stage together, performing “(Hit Me) . . . Baby One More Time.”
Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.



Ghomeshi, complainant struck up flirtatious email relationship, court hears

They started kissing and Lucy DeCoutere said Jian Ghomeshi choked her with his hand for 10 seconds. Then slapped her three times. The Crown asked if it was consensual. “It’s impossible to consent to something you were not asked,” she told court.

The Star's investigative reporter Kevin Donovan gives an update on the Jian Ghomeshi sex assault trial.

Photos View photos

  • Lucy DeCoutere and Jian Ghomeshi in a park after brunch in 2003. Defence lawyer Marie Henein on Thursday presented this photo and others to court as exhibits.zoom
On the summer weekend 13 years ago when Lucy DeCoutere alleges Jian Ghomeshi choked and slapped her in his Riverdale home they went on to attend a night-time barbecue and “cuddled” in a park after morning brunch.
Photos of the two at these social events were shown on the court’s jumbo screen in a day that ended with a classic Marie Henein shocker: There’s more to come.
“Do you want to tell his honour the real conversation? The one that you have not told anybody even today?” said Henein, Ghomeshi’s lawyer, addressing the composed DeCoutere. Henein on her feet, voice stern, moving a bit like her late mentor the famous trial lawyer, Eddie Greenspan, looking ready to pounce.
“I’m not sure what you mean,” DeCoutere told court.
Then the clock struck 4:30, and those in a modern Netflix audience so used to what one media onlooker called “binge watching” realized they would have to hold their breath until Friday morning at 10.
The day began with a Crown swap. Assistant Crown attorney Corie Langdon took over at the podium for Michael Callaghan and asked DeCoutere some preliminary questions to establish her background. Captain in the Royal Canadian Air Force, actor and producer. DeCoutere is well known for playing the character, Lucy, in Trailer Park Boys. She has a master’s degree in teaching, court heard.
Lucy DeCoutere and Jian Ghomeshi in a park after brunch in 2003. Defence lawyer Marie Henein on Thursday presented this photo and others to court as exhibits.
Court Exhibit
Lucy DeCoutere and Jian Ghomeshi in a park after brunch in 2003. Defence lawyer Marie Henein on Thursday presented this photo and others to court as exhibits.
Court was told how DeCoutere and Ghomeshi met in Banff at a television festival in 2003. DeCoutere, seemingly getting out ahead of her story before Henein began her cross examination, admitted that she and the former CBC host struck up a flirtatious email and phone relationship that included what she said were “bawdy” and “outrageous” comments at times. DeCoutere said she used “weird” slang for sexual acts in emails. One time she emailed him a comment about a “rusty trumbone,” which she said describes a sex act.
DeCoutere said she was joking in all of these email and phone conversations and not suggesting a sexual act she intended to engage in with Ghomeshi. They never had sex, she said.
Then she described her trip to Toronto from her home base in New Brunswick. They went on a date and Ghomeshi warned her about rumours associated with him. That he was funded by the Palestine Liberation Organization. That he was gay.
“I’d like to go back to my house and listen to music and hold you,” DeCoutere recalled Ghomeshi telling her. She thought that was “cheesy,” but went back anyway to see his house and get a sweater for a proposed nighttime walk. There, she noticed flower arrangements and meticulously arranged shirts, a closet that seemed organized by colour.
They started kissing and DeCoutere said Ghomeshi choked her with his hand for 10 seconds, enough that “I couldn’t breathe.” Then slapped her three times. The Crown asked if it was consensual.
“It’s impossible to consent to something you were not asked,” she told court. She remained for an hour and told court that on reflection it is “outrageous” that she stayed. One reason she stayed and sat on the couch and then kissed him goodbye was that she wanted to “normalize” the situation.
Also, “I was blaming myself for putting myself in a dangerous situation which should not have been dangerous,” she told Mr. Justice William B. Horkins.
Following the assault she described, DeCoutere said they saw each other throughout the weekend — at a barbecue at Ghomeshi’s former bandmate Murray Foster’s place, some industry parties and brunch.
(Court heard that this three-day period was Friday, July 4 to Sunday, July 6 but that struck watchers of the trial as odd since the allegations on the police charge sheet are the week before.)
She saw him again over the years, running into him at entertainment-related events. Once she appeared in her Trailer Park Boys character on CBC’s Q on the East Coast, doing a joking bit on air with Ghomeshi about finding a date for her character, possibly even Ghomeshi.
“I wouldn’t want to disappoint you, Lucy,” Ghomeshi said to laughter.
“I’m sure you wouldn’t disappoint me, Jian,” she replied, in character.
Years later, when Ghomeshi was fired in 2014 by CBC, DeCoutere told court how she reached out to media, first the Toronto Star but in total she gave 24 interviews telling her story.
“I thought oh my God, I am not the only person this happened to,” she told court.
And then Henein’s cross examination began, slowly at first with questions about whether the choking came before the slapping, the slapping before the choking, or whether there was a pause (as DeCoutere said) between the slaps. Henein raised the media interviews, who she talked to and why she talked.
Henein then displayed a series of photos to court from that weekend in 2003. DeCoutere “cuddling” in Riverdale Park, DeCoutere looking tipsy at the barbecue. Police, court heard, did not hear about many of these details which DeCoutere called “after incident contact.”
Henein: “You don’t remember cuddling with a guy who choked and slapped you?”
DeCoutere: “Memory is an interesting thing. I don’t remember these photographs being taken . . . . I don’t remember cuddling in the park. I guess because it clearly didn’t leave an impression on me.”
As the afternoon in court wore on, Henein asked questions about the celebrity that this case had brought DeCoutere, how she had resisted the normal publication ban in cases like this and how so many women, victims of sexual assault, had come forward to her saying that she was their hero.
DeCoutere said that was a pleasant surprise. “I was bracing myself and my family for online aggression.”

Henein, eye on the time, put some emails to DeCoutere, as she had done at the start of the week to the first complainant.
After she came forward with her allegations against Ghomeshi, DeCoutere emailed friends saying: “I want him f---ing decimated,” “I’m going to press charges just to get the ball rolling,” “the guy’s a s--- show, time to flush,” and “I hope he’s panic eating . . . I hope he gets chubby, really chubby.”
DeCoutere also sent an email to a fellow complainant saying the coming trial would be “theatre at its best.”
As the clock hit 4:30, the normal end of a court day, Henein alluded to something she had in her pocket or up her sleeve.

“Ms. DeCoutere I am going to do you a favour,” Henein began.
“Do you want to tell His Honour the real conversation? The one that you have not told anybody even today, even when you met with the police? Do you want to take a moment and tell the truth of the real conversation that was going on? Not the one you’ve been reporting to the media, not the one in press releases. Do you want to tell His Honour the real conversation that was going on?”
DeCoutere looked back at Henein. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“All right,” said Henein and looked at the judge. “Your Honour I wonder whether this is a good place to stop and I’ll finish tomorrow.”

DeCoutere says emails don’t change lack of consent in choking

Trailer Park Boys actress continued to write to former CBC Radio host after alleged assault, trial hears.

Jian Ghomeshi leaves court at Old City Hall in Toronto on Thursday.
Chris Young / THE CANADIAN PRESS
Jian Ghomeshi leaves court at Old City Hall in Toronto on Thursday.
Lucy DeCoutere says emails that suggest she enjoyed Jian Ghomeshi’s company do not change the fact that he choked and slapped her “without consent.”
Confronted with numerous emails by defence lawyer Marie Henein, the Trailer Park Boys actress told a Toronto court on Friday she knew their paths would continue to cross and she wanted to make Ghomeshi into a friend and neutralize the situation.
At one stage, the court gallery burst into laughter when DeCoutere said: “I feel like you have an exhibit you want to show me,” to the defence lawyer.
Henein asked why DeCoutere would try to be friends with a man who allegedly assaulted her. DeCoutere said it was normal for people to contact the people who assaulted them. She said it is like someone who is assaulted by their husband and stays married to them.
“Yeah, people do that. It’s a weird thing. But it’s real,” DeCoutere said.
DeCoutere has testified that the 48-year-old CBC Radio host started choking and slapping her in the face without warning while they were kissing at his home in July 2003.
Henein produced an email in court Friday that DeCoutere sent Ghomeshi on July 5, 2003, a day after the alleged assault. It read: “You kicked my ass last night and that makes me want to f--- your brain out. Tonight.”
Another letter she wrote to Ghomeshi read: “Jian you are great. I want to have more fun times with you . . . . I am sad we didn’t spend the night together.”
DeCoutere read the letter’s sign off at the request of Henein. It said: “I love your hands, Lucy.”
DeCoutere said that does not mean she wanted him to choke or slap her.
“He choked me without consent, because he never asked for it . . . he slapped me without consent because he never asked for it,” DeCoutere said.
When questioned by the crown later in the day, DeCoutere said it had a “weirdly apologetic tone like I had done something wrong. Like I was placating him.”
She added that Ghomeshi was funny and cool, but he also assaulted her and she was a different person when younger.
In another email sent on July 17, 2003, 13 days after the alleged assault, DeCoutere wrote to Ghomeshi: “I think you are magic and would love to see you.”
Henein then asked DeCoutere if she was prepared to admit she was lying about her feelings and about the incident. Absolutely not, DeCoutere said. DeCoutere said she forgot about the email, but it “doesn’t change the fact of the matter.”
Earlier in the trial, Henein produced an email from Nov. 24, 2003, after the Gemini Awards where DeCoutere alleges Ghomeshi once again placed his hand on her throat.
The email’s subject line was “brace yourself” and the message read: “I’m in town and am gonna call your cellphone and ask you to play me with me . . . in a manner of speaking . . . so you have fair warning.”
DeCoutere said the message may seem like a double entendre, but it was platonic.
Henein produced another email, sent around the time that read: “how busy are you gonna be in banff? i wanna play with you.”
And another, stating: “wanna go for a hike? pims on the terrace? chance encounter in the broom closet?”
The court was not shown Ghomeshi’s replies to any emails.
Henein asked DeCoutere why she didn’t tell police before this week about snuggling in the park with the man who allegedly choked and slapped her.
Is it possible that DeCoutere just forgot the things that show she is lying, Henein asked. No, DeCoutere answered.
DeCoutere said she believed her first statement to police was the first step in a longer exposition that would be teased out later by the Crown. She said her only knowledge of the legal system came from American TV shows.
Henein said DeCoutere has a lawyer who is very experienced in the process of sexual assault trials and it is not true DeCoutere did not know the process.
DeCoutere is the second complainant to take the stand at Ghomeshi’s trial.
The actress is one of three women whose complaints prompted five charges against Ghomeshi: four counts of sexual assault and one count of overcoming resistance by choking. He has pleaded not guilty.

DeCoutere says emails don’t change lack of consent in choking

Trailer Park Boys actress continued to write to former CBC Radio host after alleged assault, trial hears.

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