Montreal Gazette - Chances of conviction seen as remote

If a Montreal police investigation leads to Boston Bruins defenceman Zdeno Chara facing criminal charges, it wouldn’t be the first time a hockey player landed in court. But many in the legal profession doubt whether court is the place to deal with Chara’s Tuesday night hit against Max Pacioretty that sent the Hab’s forward to hospital with a severe concussion and a fractured cervical vertebra…

Still, McGill law professor François Crépeau said there’s no reason the case shouldn’t go to court. Hockey players, like any professionals, should be held to standards of conduct, he said.

“In any normal activity, violence that’s uncalled for is a case for damages, and may be a case for criminal charges,” he said. But Crépeau says it will take years for people to apply this to major league hockey, just like it took years for people to realize that rape was violence, not sex. “We have to determine that violence in hockey is as unacceptable in the major league as it is in the minor league.

“It will take time, but it will come.”