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CFL failed women with foot-dragging on Chad Kelly case

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CFL failed women with foot-dragging on Chad Kelly case

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Published Feb 29, 2024  •  Last updated Mar 04, 2024  •  4 minute read

Toronto Argonauts’ Chad Kelly with his award for Most Outstanding Player at the 2023 Canadian Football League (CFL) Awards in Niagara Falls, Ont. Thursday, November 16, 2023. Photo by Tara Walton /The Canadian Press

It hasn’t been a great week for the CFL.

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It’s been worse for women working in the league.

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The first disturbing news came in a lawsuit filed in Ontario last week against Toronto quarterback Chad Kelly and the Argonauts.

A former strength and conditioning coach for the team claims she endured harassment, unwanted advances and felt threatened, but was fired after reporting it.

The lawsuit was filed Feb. 21. From the CFL office: Not a word.

A day later, a report by TSN’s Rick Westhead let the rest of the world know about the allegations against Kelly and his team. From the CFL: Silence.

Finally on Wednesday, a full week after the suit and its sordid allegations were made a public record in the courts, officially putting both the Argonauts and the league on notice, the CFL issued a statement saying it’s opened an investigation of its own.

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That’s a long time for women working in the league to wonder who, exactly, has their backs.

The foot-dragging has raised eyebrows from some men, too.

“How will any woman staff member now feel comfortable saying they’ve been slighted in any way?” a member of one front office told me, asking for anonymity because he didn’t have permission to speak out.

commissioner Randy Ambrosie, in Vancouver on Thursday, told reporters he’d authorized an investigation by the end of the day last Thursday. An independent investigator was hired the next day.

Still, no public statement for another five days?

“The most important thing is we have a proper independent investigation done,” he said.

Actually, it was equally important to send a message.

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This is a league that’s had a policy on violence against women for nearly a decade. A policy that requires mandatory training for all employees, including the obvious mandate that we no longer sweep these things under the carpet.

When the policy was unveiled in 2015, it included the following statements:

“When any CFL workplace, including a CFL football club or one of its corporate offices, receives a report of violence against women involving a CFL employee, we will act.”

“We will always err on the side of safety, respect for the sanctity of human life, and every person’s inherent right to security from harm.”

Tell that to the member of the Argonauts training staff whose six-year stint with the team came to an unceremonious end in January.

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For some, the story sounds all too familiar.

“You would expect them to speak up right away and say that something’s in place and we are addressing it in some manner,” Deena Brock of the Manitoba Association of Women’s Shelters told the Winnipeg Sun. “How can you feel safe as a female if you’re working in that kind of environment?”

The CFL’s Wednesday statement said it’s taking the allegations “very seriously.” Its inaction suggested otherwise.

The woman’s lawsuit alleges Kelly made repeated advances over the last two CFL seasons, asking her out several times, which she politely declined.

He persisted and she became concerned. When she heard Kelly had accused her publicly of having romantic relations with another member of the team, she confronted him in private, the lawsuit says.

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That’s when she alleges he got aggressive, eventually yelling derogatory things in front of others and saying he couldn’t wait until she was fired.

She reported him, but things only got worse: the suit claims he was telling others she was lucky he hadn’t hurt her.
Accused by management she’d opened a can of worms she shouldn’t have opened, the woman was told in late January her contract wouldn’t be renewed.

The complainant is seeking $50,000 from Kelly and some $295,000 from the Argos.

None of the allegations have been tested in court.

Kelly denied them in a Friday post on social media.

“I am shocked by the allegations which have been made against me,” his post read. “I absolutely deny these events and intend to vigorously defend myself and will be seeking the dismissal of the action.”

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By the end of Friday, his post was deleted.

Kelly, the nephew of NFL great Jim Kelly, is one of the most high-profile players in the CFL, the winner of last season’s Most Outstanding Player Award and its most highly paid athlete.

“Women in general aren’t feeling safe,” Brock said. “We need men, especially in roles of authority, to start respecting that line. There is a line, and it doesn’t matter how much you make or how famous you are. Our youth look at these people who are in positions of power… they look at them as role models.

“So what are you telling our children? That it’s OK to be abusive to a female.”

That the CFL says it’s conducting its own investigation is puzzling, based on another statement from their 2015 policy.

“We will not act as criminal investigators, fact finders, judges or juries,” it said.

Instead, it vowed to bring in experts to provide the best possible support and referrals to the women affected.

Every woman working in the league was affected.

And every one of them was left out on a limb.

pfriesen@postmedia.com
X: @friesensunmedia

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