Update on the Hockey Canada series (and thanks for your patience)

Hi there, I hope you're well. I know that many of you are waiting on the next part of our look at the hockey Canada case. Thank you so much for your patience and my apologies that it's taking much longer than expected. I wanted to give you a little background as to why and I am trying to turn my narrator voice off here. In the earlier years of this podcast especially, I used to frequently share behind the scenes details about what was going on in my life, how I felt about the cases I was looking into and difficulties I was experiencing along the way with the odd snarky comment. I've always been an open book, aware your heart on your sleeve kind of person and it was easy to carry that over to the podcast when the audience was smaller and more niche. But I started Canadian True Crime during the True Crime boom when a hungry growing audience was eagerly looking for more content with far less selection than there is today. And I didn't put much effort into promoting the podcast but because it was the right place at the right time, the audience grew quickly. And I took all feedback on board, positive and negative using it to try and improve. I do have perfectionistic tendencies and I'm obviously a highly sensitive person. So it really got to me when people got noticeably angry in response to what I said or shared. Because people can get really personal and insulting in their criticism, I felt like it was me making them angry and I really didn't like having that effect on people. So gradually I found myself becoming hyper aware of everything I said on the podcast and social media and trying to minimize the potential to upset someone somewhere. This doesn't mean I shied away from taking a principled stance on an issue related to a case that I think is important and no is going to be controversial to some people. I'm okay with that but I otherwise tried to avoid it unless really necessary. It took me probably longer than it should to realize that this will always be a losing battle because in most cases it wasn't really me making people angry. They were already angry and it's impossible to predict the unique viewpoints, experiences and biases that individuals end up using as a lens to perceive the voice they're hearing and the content they're consuming. So I came to the conclusion that the less I said, the less I shared, the less people would be angry and the less guilty and exhausted I would feel about the whole thing. So I withdrew on the podcast on social media and it's bled into my personal life. It did quite in the noise but it's made me feel pretty disconnected from people, friends and the audience. You and there's still so much anger out there. So I know it was a failed experiment based on a very naive premise but it's not easy to come back from. I kind of dug myself into a whole and the hyper vigilance is worse than ever. It is impossible to rid your brain of the things it already knows, years of taking in all those different perspectives and viewpoints. I also have ADHD so I already have a hyperactive mind and my special skill I think is curiosity combined with attention to detail and it was an advantage when I worked in corporate marketing communication and I suspect it's the main reason for this podcast success, a kind of point of difference. I do love to dive into the weeds and try to make sense of it but it's not a fast process and it ties into that hyper vigilance as well, not just from an audience feedback perspective but in the way that I work with victims and survivors and the potential to get things wrong or unintentionally misrepresent something which could ultimately result in legal action. So it's a process but I think it served me well. The podcast has never been threatened with legal action, we've never been asked to take an episode down, never had plagiarism accusations or any big controversy but it takes longer and longer to produce episodes and today with the algorithm driven content farms and low effort AI Slop. Audiences have been primed to expect new episodes in a lot less time than they actually take to meaningfully create. If podcasting relied on an algorithm instead of the fairness of an RSS feed, I'd have been out of the game years ago. So in a nutshell, all of those reasons tie into why we don't usually cover ongoing trials or cases on this podcast. I like to wait until the dust has settled so I can look at all the details in a holistic way. But the hockey Canada case and this mini series has unfolded under pretty unique circumstances and I want to share those with you to explain why I decided to break with our usual stance of not covering a current case and why it's taking so long. Earlier this year I was involved in the filming of a Canadian documentary for CBC, it's currently in post-production but I'll share more details about it as soon as I can. Survivors, JB and Kelly Favreau, my special guests on this mini series, were involved in the documentary as well. That's how they first connected with each other and I know it was meaningful for them both and for me. So that was happening at the same time as the hockey Canada trial was unfolding as a massive debacle with mistrials, jury dismissals, a judge alone proceeding and months of national and international headlines. I wasn't following the trial closely because I was focused on the details of the cases I was working on like the shed in massacre and the Richardson family. But JB and Kelly were of course following it. We had a group chat going and they were sharing really unique perspectives and insights with me that the public doesn't get to hear since survivors are often silenced by publication bans and shame. This conversation inspired us to co-found our little advocacy group beyond the verdict.ca. I wanted to support JB and Kelly and responding publicly to sexual assault trials to challenge the rape myths and stereotypes that continue to be incorporated despite multiple Supreme Court rulings and rape-shield laws designed to prevent it. We also wanted to push back on the cruel tactics used by defense lawyers that often mirror the very abuse that victim complainants came forward to report in the first place. We kicked off our little advocacy group earlier this summer as we waited for the judge to deliver her verdicts in the hockey Canada case. JB wrote an op-ed that the Globe and Mail published in print and online as part of their case coverage titled "When aggressive tactics are praised as legal strategy, it survivors like me who pay the price." In her piece, JB pulls back the curtain on what it's really like to testify as a victim complainant especially in a high-profile sexual assault case. She also connects her own experiences with what we saw happening in the hockey Canada trial. JB concludes her op-ed with this quote, "I believe that if our justice system requires the public dismantling of a survivor to function, then we need to seriously rethink what we're calling justice until that changes more survivors will choose silence. And when silence feels safer than seeking justice, we should all be asking who was the system really protecting?" Kelly Favreau and I were an awe of JB's courage and reclaiming her voice to speak directly to the public for the first time and the piece was really well received. I've linked it in the show notes. As a part of all of this, I also invited JB and Kelly to join me for a high-level conversation about the hockey Canada trial to describe how they were feeling as we waited for the judges verdict. For me, it was my special project for the summer. And Kelly and JB had a lot to say because this was one of the most complex sexual assault trials in Canadian history, perhaps the most complex, with a stark, multi-layered power imbalance. One young woman against a group of up to 10 elite athletes fresh from celebrating a championship win. And the case was marked by contradictions and inconsistencies on both sides that made it hard to see the forest for the trees. Well, I got caught up in the weeds like I always do. It started with me looking into the case to explain the background and context behind the themes that JB and Kelly were bringing up. But it's like a rabbit hole. The more you dig, the more you find, and the deeper the hole gets. And all this, so for a busy summer when the kids are off school, and mine are now in that adolescent phase where they're too old to need childcare but not old enough to be independent. So with all of this, I was still scrambling to finish the episode as Justice Maria Carassia was delivering her verdict on July 24th. I was close, but I just couldn't get it done in time. And when the judge found all five accused men not guilty on all charges, delivering an unprecedented 90-page oral and written judgment explaining her decision in excruciating detail, I realized I had to go back to the drawing board and look at everything again. This realization was a massive blow to us all and I'm grateful that Kelly and JB were extremely gracious about it. it and patient with me. They've also been a massive help, assisting me to research and weighed through the huge amount of documentation in this case. So we finished part one, but then it was time to head off on a family road trip. I returned to working on part two as soon as we got back, but to be honest, I've been stretched to my limit with the complexity of this case, the sheer level of information available, plus my family responsibilities over the summer. So all of this to explain why part two is taking so much longer than I expected or wanted, although it wasn't for lack of trying. My apologies, I naively bit off more than I could chew in trying something different, and that's on me. I suppose this is one of the downsides to running a passion project, but I've never put out a half baked episode yet, and I don't think the hockey Canada trial is the place to start. The only way past it is to get through it. So with that said, I'll get back to finishing this series. I suspect it might be another two parts, but we have important things to say to those who want or need to hear it. If you're a paid subscriber to our ad-free premium feeds on Patreon, Supercast, or Apple Podcasts, and would like to request a refund because of this, please contact us via email and we'd be happy to do that. And again, thank you all so much for your patience as we take the time that this case deserves. See you soon.