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JR LaRose won’t ever forget that awful night with his mother, and the staircase, and the man.

That man threw LaRose’s mother down a set of stairs at a house party. LaRose, then a kid, watched it happen — just like he’d watched her get abused by boyfriends on other occasions, in other settings.

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“It sticks to me, even to this day — seeing the woman who brought you into this world, being thrown down the stairs by a man, and not knowing what to do,” says LaRose, who grew into an impressive physical specimen, a CFL player, and a 2011 Grey Cup winner.

“As a young boy, I wanted to call the police, but I was scared; I thought if I call the police, will my mom go to jail? I really didn’t know what to do in that situation, so I did nothing.”

Today, LaRose is doing something.

The kid, who grew up in a tough situation in inner-city Edmonton — a father he never met, a mother who struggled with drug and alcohol addiction — is using his football platform to travel North America, talking about violence against women and how to stop it.