Secret Life by Kevin Donovan

Author:Kevin Donovan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Exposé, Criminal Trial
Publisher: Goose Lane Editions
Published: 2016-04-18T04:00:00+00:00

One day during the latter part of Ghomeshi’s time at York, a young woman named Miranda, a student, sat on a bench in York’s Central Square, listening to a story she was unprepared to hear. She had gotten to know Ghomeshi that year, and though she had heard rumours about him, she found it difficult to believe that the self-professed supporter of women’s rights would do anything to hurt a woman — that is, until another young woman, a friend, asked for a meeting. The friend had been out with Ghomeshi, and she alleged that she was the victim of an incident of sexual assault. Miranda recounted this story to me in an interview for this book, recalling to the best of her ability the story told to her in 1991; the woman who complained to Miranda would not agree to speak to me, and Ghomeshi did not respond to my questions about this incident.

“The young woman who told me this was very upset,” Miranda said. “She wanted me to confront him. She did not want to go public, and she did not want a complaint. Yet she wanted him to be outed as the character he was. She was insistent that I do something. So I did.”

After her friend spoke to her, Miranda made an appointment by telephone to see Ghomeshi. When the time arrived, her heart pounding, Miranda gathered up her nerve and a notepad and marched across the square to the York Federation of Students offices.

Miranda said hello to Jim Hounslow; he remembers her disclosing her information about Ghomeshi to him back in 1991. Notepad and pen clutched in her hand, Miranda knocked on Ghomeshi’s door. The student president opened it.

“Jean, I want to talk about something,” Miranda said.

“Sure,” Ghomeshi said, smiling. He let her in and closed the door.

Miranda opened her notepad, wanting to make a record of the conversation. This type of confrontation did not come easily to her.

“I told him what this person had said to me, and he just listened for a minute. Then [Ghomeshi] said, ‘You know I wouldn’t hurt a woman; this girl is just upset because we just broke up.’”

They continued the conversation, but Ghomeshi was adamant. “I don’t hurt women. You know me. I don’t do that.”

Leaving his office, Miranda was “shook up” but not sure what to do. She passed the campus’s sexual complaint centre as she left but did not go in because she did not have permission to name her friend. Posters on the wall featured the “No Means No” campaign that was just getting started that year.

“All I felt I could do is warn others by word of mouth,” said Miranda, recalling she felt defeated by the incident. If she took anything from that encounter with Jian Ghomeshi, it was this: “If you have a problem with him, you’re the problem.”

The Star reported the York allegations, and university officials checked and found no record of complaints related to Ghomeshi. A spokesperson told us that, given

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