The back cover of Toronto Star investigative reporter Kevin Donovan’s Secret Life: The Jian Ghomeshi Investigation (Goose Lane), released this week, promises “a thought-provoking account of the landmark Ghomeshi exposé that sparked a nationwide discussion on sexual assault.”
Donovan is a veteran journalist with a solid reputation. He’s won two Governor General’s Awards for public service journalism, three National Newspaper Awards and three Canadian Association of Journalists Awards. His name has been tied to some big stories: most notably the Ornge air ambulance controversy and, of course, the Rob Ford crack video scandal.
Donovan has also tried his hand at fiction, penning The Dead Times, a self-published mystery about a homicide-detective- turned-reporter who unravels a series of murders, including that of his girlfriend. But Secret Life is more straight-ahead reporting than non-fiction written as fiction in the vein of the New Journalism literary movement.
Those hoping for new and shocking revelations or an exposé into what makes the former CBC radio star tick may be disappointed.
Much is left unanswered, and storylines left hanging. Like, for example, Ghomeshi’s relationship with his father, the man he says taught him “what love really is.” I would have liked to know what his Iranian father thought of the son who never seemed to work hard enough and wore hair gel and eyeliner when he was 14 so he could be like his idol David Bowie.
Ghomeshi’s accusers describe him as a narcissist and master manipulator. What about psychopath?
Donovan reports that Ghomeshi slept with 1,500 women and uses one incident to suggest his alleged violent behaviour was getting to the point where it would be just a matter of time before he killed someone. Clearly, Ghomeshi got off on the violence. More than one accuser reports he lost his erection when the choking stopped.
Ghomeshi was a “god” at CBC. His was a carefully crafted image. But how much of the rest of his life was a lie? In his 2012 book, 1982, Ghomeshi wrote about growing up conflicted about his ethnicity in England in the mostly white suburbs. His mates dubbed him “Blackie,” a moniker he calls senseless and “stupid” but that had no real effect on him because all the kids had nicknames. “My skin wasn’t even a particularly dark shade of brown. You might wonder if I’m making this up,” he writes.
Donovan offers a few new details about Ghomeshi’s rise and fall and the cult of celebrity around him at the national broadcaster and his alleged ambition to follow in the immigrant footsteps of Adrienne Clarkson to become governor general.
We also learn that Big Ears Teddy, the “comfort bear” Ghomeshi’s therapist reportedly suggested he get to help with his anxiety, was lost, Ghomeshi told friends, along with some luggage on a flight in 2014. Donovan fails to resolve the speculation as to whether it contained a video camera that Ghomeshi allegedly used to film sexual encounters. Donovan seems to believe it did and wrote about getting into an argument over it with Jesse Brown, the Canadaland podcaster and former CBC employee who brought the Ghomeshi story to the Star and would later prove a handful for Star editors. Donovan hints that Brown’s motivation for getting the story out was personal. Brown has expressed regret about failing to report Ghomeshi’s abuse to CBC higher-ups when he worked there for fear of losing his job.
Questions about Donovan’s conduct have also been raised. Some of the women who shared their stories did not want him to write the book. One of them called him out while on the stand at Ghomeshi’s trial, saying he had gotten her story all wrong.
Then there is Donovan’s impromptu meeting with Ghomeshi at a private dinner for Michael Douglas at the Four Seasons Hotel during the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival. Donovan had been hot on Ghomeshi’s trail that summer, having written him and his lawyers two months earlier about allegations two women brought to the Star.
As luck would have it, Donovan and his wife were seated at the same table as Ghomeshi. Donovan didn’t come away from that encounter charmed. He speculates that Ghomeshi has body image issues. The chapter would be the book’s most compelling if most of the encounter hadn’t already been reported in the Star.
Most of the book’s first half takes readers inside the Star newsroom, outlining the ethical and legal considerations the Star’s editors and legal team weighed in their pursuit of the Ghomeshi story. Still bruising from the pummelling it took over its handling of the Rob Ford crack video scandal, the Star was reluctant to pull the trigger. Were Ghomeshi’s sexual proclivities a matter of public interest? And who among the accusers, all of whom had requested anonymity, would be willing to testify in court if it came to a libel suit?
For long stretches in the months before Ghomeshi’s firing, it wasn’t clear if the story would ever see the light of day. Sources were getting antsy. One of the women withdrew her participation for a time. All of which led to static between Donovan and Brown, whom Donovan paints as a bit of a loose cannon.
Donovan clearly had his own doubts about the accusers. But ultimately, the decision of whether to publish was made for the Star when the CBC announced in October 2014 that Ghomeshi would be taking an “undetermined” amount of time away “to deal with some personal issues.”
Ghomeshi’s lawyers had called CBC execs to a meeting ostensibly to put the matter of the allegations of sexual abuse to rest once and for all. They viewed video and text messages loaded from Ghomeshi’s phone into a computer, which seemed to back Ghomeshi’s claims that his sexual behaviour was all consensual. However, what CBC chief of public affairs Chuck Thompson and executive director of radio programming Chris Boyce saw in one video – a woman with bruises on her side caused, Donovan writes, by cracked ribs – left them stunned. They half-sprinted back to the CBC’s offices to tell their boss.
And we all know what happened after that. Donovan does not shed much more light on the allegations against Ghomeshi that ended in his acquittal on all three charges of sexual assault and one of choking.
What we’re left with is a mostly familiar portrait: the rough outlines of a petulant and deeply insecure radio star who worried about what the colour of his car says about him.
Of the scandal that would eventually engulf the CBC star, Donovan reports that Ghomeshi seemed little concerned at first, even feeling juiced, he writes, at the prospect of taking his act stateside if things didn’t work out at the CBC. He still may get the chance.
Donovan ends on a positive note, even while raising questions about why cops laid charges in the first place that they knew wouldn’t stand up at trial. At least we’re still having that “national conversation” about sexual violence against women.
enzom@nowtoronto.com | @enzodimatteo
