In the eyes of the law, Jian Ghomeshi is not guilty. He has been acquitted of four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking. He was acquitted despite the fact that three women, myself included, testified to what he did to us at his trial in February. He was acquitted because the judge said we were “inconsistent” with our memories, that our motives were questionable and that we had deliberately lied in court.

When the verdict came down, I was sitting in front of the judge, William Horkins, in the same Toronto courtroom I had testified in. I listened to him call my testimony “unreliable” and say that I had wanted to be a “heroine for the cause” – accusing me of seeking media publicity.

The degradations of the assault were, at least, private. Imposed on me, but in my power to process. But the trial has been public and I’ve never lived through anything more harmful or humbling than having a spotlight shone on my frailties and being mocked in open court.

As the only named witness in the case against Jian, I spent 12 months preparing for my two days of testimony. I felt ready to face whatever his notoriously cutthroat lawyer Marie Henein had in store for me. Now I know I never had a chance.

The night before the first day in court, I went for dinner with my lawyer Gillian Hnatiw at a restaurant in downtown Toronto. On the wax paper tablecloth, she drew the architecture of the courtroom and gave me directions: listen to the questions, don’t fidget. She reminded me about the importance of synonyms. Did somebody hit you or did they slap you? There’s a difference. She also told me exactly how packed the room was going to be with press: wall-to-wall journalists who would be tweeting everything.

I felt ready to face what Marie Henein had in store for me. Now I know I never had a chance

The next morning, a police car was waiting for me outside my hotel to take me to court. As we pulled up to the courthouse, I saw press vans lined up outside the building, but I was surprised to hear there were protesters there – alongside the journalists – to support me. They had showed up on one of the coldest days of the year.

Even after I got inside, it was hours before I was finally called to the stand. I was calm and composed. Again, I felt ready. But as I made my way down the stairs to the courtroom, the enormity of what I was about to do finally hit me. Everything I had prepared for was leading to this moment. I leaned against the wall and took a deep breath. They opened the door and I walked in.

From then on, the whole experience was like a movie. I weaved my way down the aisle and walked past the press, the onlookers and the teams of lawyers. I took the stand and swore to tell the truth.

I could see all the players in the case from my perch. Here was Michael Callaghan, the Crown prosecutor who had brought the case against Jian on behalf of the state. He wore a bow-tie. He was the person I was going to be spending the day talking to.

Opposite him was Henein, Ghomeshi’s star lawyer, the Hannibal Lecter that anyone following the case has heard about. She’s very ... angular. There’s no better way to describe her. She wears stilettos and blazers with notched collars and zippers. She is beautifully put together, manicured from top to tail in a way that conveys control. She’s a near perfect contrast to Callaghan.

Jian Ghomeshi leaves a Toronto courthouse with his lawyer Marie Henein on 2 Feburary. Photograph: Frank Gunn/AP

Finally, I saw Jian. Sitting still with his lips pursed at the defense table. There he was, in his neat little suit, surrounded by the million-dollar legal team he’d hired to protect himself from the very women he once found so easy to dominate – to slap, choke and punch.

I got through my first day of testimony, during which the Crown asked me about the details of my assault, relatively unscathed. I told him about how I first met Jian. I told him about the night he assaulted me. I told him about why I decided to come forward. I was on the stand for two and a half hours.

Day one went just as Gillian had told me it would, but I knew Henein was going to come at me swinging the next day.

•••

When I first went to the police, I had very little knowledge about how this would unfold. I just gave them my witness statement as evidence that something happened. I didn’t know it was going to trigger a criminal case. I didn’t know that Marie Henein was going to make me look like a fool.

What Henein did destroyed my testimony. Using what I said to Jian in emails and a letter that I don’t even remember sending, she argued that I tried to cover up the fact that I had a relationship with Jian after the assault and lied to the court in the process.

She told the court that I enticed him; that I had always been an attention seeker; that I was coming forward as an excuse to get interviews with the press. Now I know this defence strategy is called “whacking”. Henein’s barrage of questions sought to whittle away at my allegations by undermining my credibility. Her main argument was to show that the nature of my relationship with Jian after he assaulted me proved that I was an unreliable witness, and that my testimony couldn’t be counted on.

If anybody – the police, the Crown – had told me about what post-incident contact is or why it matters, that would have gone a long way. It might not have helped me remember everything, but it might have helped me go back to that state of mind. Now, I know that when it comes to a victim’s testimony, what happened after the assault is just as important as what happened before – at least as far as the court is concerned. Everything Henein asked me came back to one big question: why did I keep in touch with Jian? The answer is that it was my way of processing what happened to me, of neutralizing a volatile situation he created. But for her and the judge, it turns out, that wasn’t enough.

Henein kept saying the same thing over and over again. “Do you remember this?” “No, I don’t.” “Did you write this?” “I don’t remember.” It’s not that I was disputing that I had written the words. It was just ludicrous that she just kept drilling me with email after email, over and over.

Henein didn’t have any notes, just a stack of folders – and in each one, an email printed on a single piece of paper. She went through them methodically: opened one, read it, closed it. Next folder.

This went on until it almost became routine. Until she pulled out an email and asked me to read it out loud. It was the email where I said: “You kicked my ass last night and that makes me want to fuck your brains out.” And that’s when I knew it was over. My testimony had fallen apart.

At that point, the spar shifted to a battle. But I also knew, especially with all the press being in the room, that I didn’t want to get upset with Henein. She’s the kind of person who, if she knows she’s got you, will just get worse.

Then, she pulled out a collection of six pieces of pink paper I hadn’t seen in almost 15 years. I asked to have a few seconds to read it and she said: “Oh, we’re going to go through this line by line.” She asked me to read four words I couldn’t believe I had written: “I love your hands.”

It was heartbreaking. If you read the letter, it has this sort of apologetic tone running through it – like I was trying to make up for something, like I was apologising for not being open-minded enough. In my letter, I told Jian I thought he was great. I told him I wanted to see more of him, I lamented that we weren’t able to spend the night together.



All of the build-up, my 12 months of preparation, had come down to this: a letter I didn’t remember writing. Did I willfully withhold it? No, I didn’t remember doing it – but that sounds like it’s the same thing. There is no way I would have kept that a secret from the Crown.

At this stage, I thought about my parents, who were going to read about it. I thought about all the journalists live-tweeting the trial. I thought about how my own words, written 13 years ago, were now being used against me to argue that I had been complicit in my own assault.

Now, I feel nothing. I’m sure that will change. But in the aftermath of this verdict, I don’t feel anything at all. All I know is that the trial has been immeasurably more traumatic than what Jian did to me. Because after everything I went through, Jian is free.



