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Jian Ghomeshi, Canadian Radio Host, Charged With Sexual Assault Star Radio Host in Canada, Facing Sex Charges, Is Granted Bail
(about 5 hours later)
OTTAWA — One of Canada’s best-known radio hosts, Jian Ghomeshi, was arrested on Wednesday by the Toronto police and charged with sexual assault. The arrest came a month after the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation fired Mr. Ghomeshi, saying managers had seen “graphic evidence” that he had injured a woman. OTTAWA — Until a month ago, Jian Ghomeshi was a celebrity with few peers at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. His weekday arts and entertainment radio program, “Q,” had brought younger listeners to the public broadcaster and raised its profile in the United States through syndication. Separately, he hosted both the network’s annual competition to select a book for all Canadians to read and Canada’s most valuable literary award, the Scotiabank Giller Prize.
After Mr. Ghomeshi was abruptly removed in late October as the host of “Q,” a daily arts and entertainment program on the CBC’s main radio network, several women said they had been assaulted by him physically and sexually but had been reluctant to come forward. Their allegations quickly set off a wider debate in Canada about the unwillingness of many women to report sexual assaults to the police. Now, Mr. Ghomeshi’s stardom has taken on a bizarre and sordid twist.
The case also raised questions about whether managers at the CBC, which is owned by the government, were unwilling or unable to rein in celebrity hosts — questions that echoed the case of the British television personalty Jimmy Savile and the BBC. On Wednesday, a wedge of police officers was needed to push Mr. Ghomeshi, 47, and his lawyers through a crush of journalists packed into the Art Deco lobby of a Toronto courthouse. After a turbulent month during which he was fired by the CBC after managers said they saw “graphic evidence” that he had assaulted one woman followed by a string of allegations from others, Mr. Ghomeshi (pronounced ZHEE-ahn go-MESH-ee) was charged by the Toronto police with four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking.
At least three women are believed to have formally complained to the Toronto police about Mr. Ghomeshi. In a statement, the police said he had been charged with four counts of sexual assault and one count of overcoming resistance through choking. He appeared in court on Wednesday afternoon and was released on bail of 100,000 Canadian dollars ($89,000); his lawyer indicated after the hearing that Mr. Ghomeshi would plead not guilty, but otherwise declined to comment. After promising the court to live with his mother and not leave Ontario, Mr. Ghomeshi, his carefully maintained stubble shaved off and his trendy clothing exchanged for a sober suit and tie, was released on $89,000 bail. His lawyer, her voice barely audible over the din of the crowd and the clicking of shutters, said that Mr. Ghomeshi would plead not guilty but otherwise declined to comment.
Journalists working on an article about Mr. Ghomeshi for The Toronto Star contacted the CBC, seeking a response to allegations that he had assaulted several women in the course of sexual encounters. In October Mr. Ghomeshi tried to persuade his managers that he had done nothing wrong by providing them with emails, photographs and other materials, but those materials instead led them to dismiss him. Mr. Ghomeshi’s downfall seemed to have developed out of his preference for sexual practices that he described in a since-deleted Facebook post as “a mild form of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey.’ ”
The Toronto Star published its article shortly afterward, saying that with several women, Mr. Ghomeshi had been “physically violent to them without their consent during sexual encounters or in the lead-up to sexual encounters.” The newspaper reported that he had “struck them with a closed fist or open hand; bit them; choked them until they almost passed out; covered their nose and mouth so that they had difficulty breathing; and that they were verbally abused during and after sex.” “Let me be the first to say that my tastes in the bedroom may not be palatable to some folks,” Mr. Ghomeshi wrote, adding that he never acted without consent. “They may be strange, enticing, weird, normal, or outright offensive to others.”
In a Facebook post that has since been removed, Mr. Ghomeshi, 47, said his firing had been the result of a vendetta by a woman in “her late 20s” who was angry after he ended their relationship. In the post, Mr. Ghomeshi said that he enjoyed sex he described as being “a mild form of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey,’ ” and that any interaction he had with women was with their consent. But over the past few months, several women have come forward to newspapers and broadcasters with accounts of what they called attacks. Several said they were struck in the head and elsewhere without warning or were choked. Two of the women told The Toronto Star that before being assaulted by Mr. Ghomeshi at his home, he turned a blue stuffed animal named Big Ears Teddy to face a wall and said that it “shouldn’t see this.”
The women who have since come forward to the police have all denied giving Mr. Ghomeshi permission to assault them. Several legal experts have said that under Canadian law, whether a victim has given consent makes no difference in the culpability of an assailant. Their allegations quickly set off a wider debate in Canada, particularly on social media, about the unwillingness of many women to report sexual assaults to the police.
Mr. Ghomeshi hired a public relations firm to try to deal with the scandal, but it has since dropped him as a client. He filed suit against the CBC over his dismissal, but he withdrew that suit on Tuesday and agreed to reimburse the network for its legal costs in relation to the suit. The CBC reported that he was still contesting his firing through a union grievance. The case came at a difficult time for the CBC, which is owned by the government and is in the midst of staff cutbacks. People inside and outside the network have raised questions about whether its managers were unwilling or unable to rein in celebrity hosts — questions that echoed the case of the British television personality Jimmy Savile and the BBC.
Mr. Ghomeshi, who was born in England to Iranian parents, had an atypical career path at the CBC. He first rose to prominence as a drummer and singer in a Canadian band and eventually wound up hosting an obscure pop culture program on the CBC’s all-news cable channel. But he rose to prominence with “Q” on the broadcaster’s popular main radio network.
In a country that promotes multicultural diversity, Mr. Ghomeshi seemed an ideal host.
Unlike other CBC programs, which tend to be directed and devised by producers, “Q,” which started seven years ago, had Mr. Ghomeshi as the driving force. Mr. Ghomeshi broke with the CBC’s practice of primarily promoting Canadian talent by actively courting Hollywood stars and best-selling American authors and musicians as guests.
The midmorning program occasionally broadcast from United States cities, most recently Los Angeles, and was sold to 57 public radio stations in the United States.
Mr. Ghomeshi’s sometimes demanding ways with his staff were widely known within Canadian media circles. Earlier this year, however, Jesse Brown, a freelance journalist and podcaster, began working with a Toronto Star reporter on an article about allegations that Mr. Ghomeshi engaged in nonconsensual, violent sex with women.
It was their inquiries to the CBC that led network executives to confront Mr. Ghomeshi. In an attempt to exonerate himself, Mr. Ghomeshi, who is not married, handed over texts, emails and photographs related to his sexual encounters, according to a CBC account of the inquiry. Instead, disturbed by what they saw, the executives fired him.
A giant portrait of Mr. Ghomeshi was swiftly taken down at the network’s English language broadcast headquarters in Toronto, and all references to him were purged with similar speed from its website. The future of “Q” is under review as it continues with guest hosts and a new executive producer. And at the Scotiabank Giller Prize awards this month, a comedian from the CBC’s television network stepped in as host. He avoided any jokes about Mr. Ghomeshi.