sport news Exiled NHL coach Joel Quenneville will discuss reinstatement with commissioner ... trends now
By Alex Hammer for DailyMail.com
The 'John Doe' hockey player who accused a Blackhawks assistant coach of sexually assaulting him in 2010 came forward in 2021.
Kyle Beach revealed the bombshell during an emotional interview with Canadian sports network TSN - a day after a report chronicling an investigation into the incident was made public.
The report found that the Blackhawks had failed to act after Beach told several senior staffers that video coach Brad Aldrich had sexually assaulted the then 20-year-old during the team's successful postseason run during the 2010 Stanley Cup playoffs.
Beach, a member of the Chicago club's minor league affiliate team at the time of the alleged assault, made the revelation during an emotional interview with Canadian sports network TSN Wednesday night
According to the report, the encounter between John Doe, then 20, and Brad Aldrich (left), then 27, occurred on May 8 or 9 in 2010. Doe told investigators that Aldrich threatened him with a souvenir baseball bat before forcibly performing oral sex on him and masturbating on the player's back, allegations that he also detailed in a lawsuit. Aldrich told investigators the encounter was consensual. Aldrich was convicted in 2013 in Michigan of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a student and is now on that state's registry of sex offenders, Chicago public radio station WBEZ reported in a series of stories based on legal filings, police records and interviews
During the interview, Beach told reporter Rick Westhead that he felt an overwhelming sense of 'relief and vindication' upon the report's release, which spurred him to finally speak up.
'It was a day of many emotions,' Beach said during the Wednesday interview. 'I cried, I smiled, I laughed, I cried some more.'
'It was no longer my word against everybody else's.'
Beach then added that he had 'buried this' secret for 11 years.
'It destroyed me from the inside out,' he told Westhead.
Beach was a member of the Chicago club's minor league affiliate team at the time of the alleged assault, but was called up the main squad during that year's postseason.
He added that he believed that all of the players and staffers in the Blackhawks locker room knew of the incident between him and Aldrich.
'Word spread pretty quick,' he said during the televised segment on the Canadian network, which is partially owned by ESPN.
'Because the comments were made in the locker room, they were made on the ice, they were made around the arena with all different people of all different backgrounds - players, staff, media in the presence.'
The 107-page document, made public in 2021, refers to Beach as 'John Doe,' and found that 'nothing was done' by Blackhawks brass in 2010 after the then aspiring pro player told senior staffers that he had been sexually assaulted and harassed by then video coach Aldrich.
Kyle Beach said on Wednesday he is the player who raised sexual assault allegations against a Chicago Blackhawks coach in 2010, following the release of a report into the incident by the National Hockey League
According to the report, commissioned by the Blackhawks and carried out by former US attorney Reid Schar, the encounter between Beach and Aldrich, then 27, took place on May 8 or 9 in 2010.
During the encounter, Aldrich invited Beach to his apartment, 'provided him with dinner and drinks,' and 'told him he had the power to get [Beach] onto the Blackhawks' roster,' and proceeded to turn on pornography, the report details.
The report also states that Aldrich threatened Beach with a souvenir baseball bat before forcibly performing oral sex on him and masturbating on his back, telling Beach that 'he needed to act like he enjoyed the sexual encounter' or he 'would never play in the NHL 'or walk' again' - allegations that Beach also detailed in a lawsuit filed against the Blackhawks in May of this year.
Aldrich, however, told investigators the encounter was consensual - a sentiment that Beach vehemently denies.
With that said, the ex-video coach was convicted of another sex crime in
