Violence has been a part of ice hockey since at least the early 1900s. According to the book Hockey: A People's History, in 1904 alone, four players were killed during hockey games from the frequent brawls and violent stickwork.[1]
More modern examples of violence include brawls, bench-clearing brawls, fighting, fan involvement,[2] physical abuse of officials and deliberately injuring opponents. Violent actions such as kicking, hitting from behind and prohibited stickwork, are penalized with suspensions or fines. Fighting, or fisticuffs, is also penalized but is considered by many hockey enthusiasts, particularly in North America, to be quite distinct from stick-swinging or other violent acts. They regard fighting as an entrenched, acceptable and integral part of the game.
On the ice, referees may impose penalties for prohibited activities. Off the ice, the National Hockey League (NHL) sometimes fines, suspends or expels players. The criminal justice system has also occasionally charged and convicted players. As a result, hockey has become much more regulated and the violent element much more controlled. This has been aided, in no small part, by dramatic increases in disciplinary processes and technology allowing for a high level of scrutiny of any event which occurs.
History
Early hockey in particular was noted for its extreme violence, to the point where two players were killed in three years during brawls. In both cases, the accused assailants were acquitted, but these and other bloody incidents led to calls for the sport to clean up its act or be banned along with the likes of cockfighting.[3] The worst of the violence waned, particularly with the advent of regulations for quasi-legal fisticuffs, though incidents continue to occur from time to time.
Billy Coutu was the first, and to date only, player banned from the NHL for life for violence in 1927; he assaulted referee Jerry Laflamme and tackled referee Billy Bell before starting a bench-clearing brawl during a Stanley Cup game between the Boston Bruins and Ottawa Senators, apparently on the orders of Bruins Head Coach Art Ross. The NHL's first president, Frank Calder, expelled Coutu from the NHL for life; the ban was lifted after two-and-a-half years, but Coutu never played in the NHL again.
Other incidents include the December 12, 1933, event when Eddie Shore rammed Toronto Maple Leafs star Ace Bailey from behind, causing Bailey to strike his head on the ice; Bailey never played hockey again. More recently, controversy and criminal charges have resulted from violent attacks by Marty McSorley, Todd Bertuzzi and Chris Simon.
In January 2012, David Johnston, the Governor General of Canada, said that violence such as headshots, high-sticking and fighting should not be part of the sport.[6]
Reports investigating violence
There have been two major Canadian reports on violence in hockey. In 1974, William McMurtry provided a report for the Government of Ontario entitled Investigation and Inquiry into Violence in Amateur Hockey. In 2000, Bernie Pascall prepared a report for the Government of British Columbia entitled Eliminating Violence in Hockey.[7]
1905 – Allan Loney was charged with manslaughter in the on-ice clubbing death of Alcide Laurin. Loney claimed self-defence, and was found not guilty.[8]
1907 – Ottawa Victorias player Charles Masson was charged with manslaughter after Cornwall player Owen McCourt died of a head wound sustained in a brawl. Masson was found not guilty on the grounds that there was no way to know which blow had killed McCourt.[10]
1908 – Charles Spittal (of Renfrew Riversides) arrested for knocking out Oren Frood of Pembroke (UOVHL) on January 17, 1908. Charge was withdrawn on January 20, 1908.[11]
1910 – Rusty Crawford, while a member of the Prince Albert Mintos, assaulted Reginald Brehaut of the Saskatoon Strathconas in a game in Saskatoon on January 11, 1910. Crawford was later found guilty of assault on January 19 in a Saskatoon city police court and fined $5 and costs.[12]
1912 – Edgar Dey was fined $50 by Halifax magistrate's court in Nova Scotia for assaulting Patsy Séguin in a January 5 MPHL game between the Halifax Socials and Halifax Crescents.[13] Dey himself died the following month on February 13 from chest injuries thought to stem partly from his tussle with Séguin.[14]
1915 – A riot broke out at the end of a game on January 2, 1915 between Ottawa College and the Cleveland Athletic Club at the Elysium Arena in Cleveland, and Ottawa College goaltender Vincent Doran was arrested on a charge for assaulting Cleveland player Elmer Irving. Irving refused to prosecute and the case was dropped in a Cleveland police court on January 4.[16]
1915 – Roy McGiffin of the Toronto Blueshirts and Art Ross of the Ottawa Senators were involved in a fist fight with each other in a NHA game between the two clubs on February 17, 1915 which had both players arrested. They were released on $100 bail each, and later appeared in court where they were fined $1 and costs. McGiffin and Ross tossed a coin to determine who would pay the $8 bill, with McGiffin ending up paying for both.[17][18]
1916 – Skene Ronan of the Montreal Canadiens assaulted Alf Skinner of the Toronto Blueshirts in a NHA game between the two clubs on January 22, 1916 which had him arrested by police and taken to the Agnes Street station in Toronto, although he was later released on $200 bail.[19] The incident went to trial and Ronan was acquitted of the charge on January 31 before Judge Winchester in Toronto, with Canadiens manager George Kennedy acting as a witness for the defense.[20]
1918 – Joe Hall of the Montreal Canadiens and Alf Skinner of the Toronto Arenas were both arrested after an NHL game on January 28, 1918 after they had hit each other violently with their sticks. Hall and Skinner appeared in a Toronto court together on January 29 and both were released after being handed a suspended sentence.[21]
1922 – Sprague Cleghorn of the Montreal Canadiens injured three Ottawa Senators players (Frank Nighbor, Eddie Gerard and Cy Denneny) in a game on February 1, leading Ottawa police to offer to arrest him.[22]
1969 – In a pre-season game held in Ottawa, Ted Green of the Boston Bruins and Wayne Maki of the St. Louis Blues engaged in a violent, stick-swinging brawl. A fractured skull and brain damage caused Green to miss the entire 1969–70 season.[23] The NHL suspended Maki for 30 days and Green for 13 games. Both men were acquitted in court.
1975 – Dan Maloney of the Detroit Red Wings was charged with assault causing bodily harm after he attacked Brian Glennie of the Toronto Maple Leafs from behind. In exchange for a no-contest plea, Maloney did community service work and was banned from playing in Toronto for two seasons.
1975 – Police charged Boston Bruins player Dave Forbes with aggravated assault after a fight with Henry Boucha of the Minnesota North Stars. After a nine-day trial ended with a hung jury, charges against Forbes were dropped. Boucha suffered blurred vision from the incident and never fully recovered.
1976 – Philadelphia Flyers players Joe Watson, Mel Bridgman, Don Saleski and Bob "Hound" Kelly were charged with assault after using their hockey sticks as weapons in a violent playoff game between the Flyers and the Toronto Maple Leafs in which fans had been taunting the Flyers players and spitting at them. Bridgman was acquitted, but the other three Flyers were found guilty of simple assault.
1980 – Jimmy Mann of the Winnipeg Jets left the bench and sucker-punched Pittsburgh Penguin Paul Gardner, breaking Gardner's jaw in two places. Mann was fined $500 and given a suspended sentence in Winnipeg.
1988 – Dino Ciccarelli hit Maple Leafs defenceman Luke Richardson with his stick. Charged and convicted of assault, he was sentenced to one day in jail and fined $1,000.
1992 – Enrico Ciccone of the IHL's Kalamazoo Wings was arrested on a battery charge after San Diego Gulls photographer Essy Ghavameddini was cut and received a deep bruise below his left eye that required stitches. Ciccone assaulted him after entering the penalty box from where Ghavameddini was photographing the game.[25]
1998 – Jesse Boulerice of the Plymouth Whalers was suspended for the rest of the playoffs after violently swinging his stick at Guelph Storm forward Andrew Long. Boulerice was charged with assault as a result of the incident.
2000 – Marty McSorley of the Boston Bruins hit Vancouver Canucks player Donald Brashear in the head with his stick in the waning moments of the game, after losing a fight to Brashear earlier in the game. McSorley was convicted of assault with a weapon and given an 18-month conditional discharge.
2004 – In the Todd Bertuzzi–Steve Moore incident, Bertuzzi of the Vancouver Canucks sucker-punched Moore of the Colorado Avalanche in the back of the head, knocking him unconscious. The pair then fell to the ice with Bertuzzi's weight crushing Moore face-first into the ice, followed by several players from both teams further piling onto the mêlée. Moore sustained three fractured vertebrae, a grade three concussion, vertebral ligament damage, stretching of the brachial plexus nerves and facial lacerations. Bertuzzi was charged by police and given a conditional discharge after pleading guilty to assault causing bodily harm. His suspension resulted in a loss of $500,000 in pay and the Canucks were fined $250,000. Bertuzzi was re-instated in 2005, after a 20 game suspension and an international ban during the 2004-05 lockout season. A civil suit filed by Moore, seeking CAD$68 million in damages and loss of income, was settled on August 19, 2014. The terms of this settlement are confidential.
2015 – During the warm up before a qualifier to the SHL, André Deveaux from Rögle BK assaulted Västerås IK's unsuspecting Per Helmersson. Deveaux swung his stick and slashed Helmersson twice. The attack was retaliation for a hit from behind by Helmersson in the game before, which Deveaux claimed caused him a minor concussion. Both players could complete both games, and Deveaux was only disciplined after the game.[27][28] Deveaux was charged for the attack, but the charges were later dropped.[29]
2015 – During an Allsvenskan (Sweden's second tier league) game on March 5, 2015 Rögle BK forward Jakob Lilja cross-checked Malmö Redhawks defenceman Jens Olsson from behind in the neck area. Lilja received a 10-game suspension, with four of the games converted into a monetary fine as per custom. Over three years later, on July 10, 2018 the Supreme Court of Sweden, after the case had first gone through the lower District Court of Malmö, handed Lilja a one-month probation sentence while removing the earlier imposed monetary fine because Lilja had already been imposed a fine by the ice hockey Disciplinary Committee.[30]
2023 - Adam Johnson of the Nottingham Panthers in the Elite Ice Hockey League died on October 28 as a result of skate slash to his neck by Matt Petgrave during a game.[31] Petgrave was later arrested on suspicion of manslaughter on November 14, and released on bail.[32][33] The incident renewed a debate about the safety of the sport and the International Ice Hockey Federation and multiple national associations made neck guards mandatory to be worn at all levels. [34][35]
Longest suspensions
All of these incidents are in the NHL of the United States and Canada, unless noted otherwise.
McKinley, Michael (2006). Hockey: A People's History. McClelland & Stewart. ISBN 978-0771057717.
Chi-Kit Wong, John (2009). Coast to Coast: Hockey in Canada to the Second World War. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0802095329.
Notes
^Drewery, Laine (Writer and Director); Chong, Wayne (Producer) (2006). Hockey: A People's History, Episode 1 - A simple game, DVD Chapter — From sport to spectacle (DVD). Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
^YouYube Video, "Boston Bruins go into the stands in 1979, https://youtube.com/watch?v=fpbD6W7YT5A
^"Injuries of Mickey MacKay are serious" The Calgary Daily Herald, March 3, 1919.
^"Mickey MacKay may return to oldtime form" The Morning Leader, October 31, 1924.
^"Fighting has no place in hockey, GG says". CBC. January 26, 2012. Retrieved January 26, 2012.
^Violence, Not Part of Youth Hockey Archived 2007-08-21 at the Wayback Machine, pilot project working paper, Nanaimo Minor Hockey Association, September 10, 2003
^"Crawford guilty and fined $5 – Some Strong Cross Swearing on the Hockey Assault Case in the Police Court". The Daily Phoenix (Star-Phoenix), Saskatoon. January 19, 1910 (p. 8).
^"Fined fifty dollars" Ottawa Citizen. January 11, 1912 (p. 9). Retrieved April 20, 2022.
^"Hockeyist's death arouses sympathy" Victoria Daily Times. February 21, 1912 (p. 6). Retrieved April 20, 2022.
^""Bad Joe" Hall and Alfie Skinner got off on suspended sentence for fracas in Toronto match" Ottawa Citizen. Jan. 30, 1918 (p. 6). Retrieved 2020-07-30.
^"Ottawa Hockey Club requests president to expel Cleghorn" Ottawa Citizen. Feb. 3, 1922 (p. 11). Retrieved 2020-07-30.
^CBC Sports 2004 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFCBC_Sports2004 (help)
^Willes, Ed (2004). The Rebel League. McClelland & Stewart. p. 168. ISBN 0-7710-8947-3.
^"Arrest Mars Gulls Game". Geis, John. Los Angeles Times. November 8, 1992. Retrieved 2016-01-13.
^"Hockey Player Is Charged" Los Angeles Times. Feb 4, 1999. Retrieved 2020-10-18.
^"Deveaux: "Jag kommer inte att be om ursäkt"". sydsvenskan.se. 8 May 2015. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^"Överfallet under uppvärmningen". aftonbladet.se. 29 March 2015. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^"Andre Deveaux slipper åtal". aftonbladet.se. 10 July 2015. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^"Sweden: Supreme Court Rules Ice Hockey Player’s Cross-Check Constitutes Assault, Not Excused as Part of Game" Library of Congress – Law (loc.gov/law). Hofverberg Elin. July 19, 2018. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
^Snow, Emma; Jefford, Will (4 November 2023). "Adam Johnson: Crowds gather to pay tribute to ice hockey player". BBC News. Retrieved 2024-06-17.
^Hartley, Joshua (30 October 2023). "Official police statement after death of Nottingham Panthers star Adam Johnson". Nottingham Post. Retrieved 2024-06-17.
^"Adam Johnson death: Matt Petgrave released on bail after being charged with manslaughter of ex-Penguins player". CBSSports.com. 2023-11-15. Retrieved 2024-06-17.
^"Neck guards will be mandatory at Olympics after Adam Johnson's death". theguardian.com. 2023-12-04. Retrieved 2024-06-17.
^"International Ice Hockey Federation mandates neck guards to be worn at all levels following Adam Johnson's death". cnn.com. 2023-12-05. Retrieved 2024-06-17.
^"Voynov suspended for 2019-20 NHL season, Stanley Cup Playoffs". NHL.com. 9 April 2019. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
^"Lifetime ban for Damir Ryspayev". khl.ru. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^ a b"Rekordlång avstängning för Deveaux - Sport - SVT.se". svt.se. 15 April 2015. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^"Senators' Pinto to be suspended 41 games for violating NHL gambling rules". Sportsnet. October 26, 2023. Retrieved 26 October 2023.
^"NHL suspends Simon for 30 games". TSN. December 19, 2007. Archived from the original on 2008-01-11. Retrieved 13 February 2018.
^"A record-setting suspension from ice hockey assault in 1986" (in Finnish). Yle. 1 December 2011. Retrieved 23 May 2018.
^"Watson of Predators suspended 27 games by NHL – Forward disciplined for unacceptable off-ice conduct". NHL.com. September 12, 2018. Retrieved April 13, 2019.
