Late on Friday afternoon, the Ottawa Senators announced a change in the status of Assistant General Manager Randy Lee.
On May 30th, Lee was charged with second degree harassment after allegedly making lewd comments and rubbing the shoulders of a 19-year-old male hotel shuttle driver in Buffalo.
Today, the Senators have decided to suspend Lee until the allegations against him are ruled on by the courts. Lee is due back in Buffalo court on July 6th.
Here is the full statement from General Manager Pierre Dorion.
“As our hockey club’s initial statement made clear, our Hockey Team – and our organization as a whole – will always hold our leaders, coaching staff, players and employees to the highest standards of behaviour.
Harassment in any form is unacceptable, whether it occurs inside or outside the work place. As a result, and with all the care and caution required in such cases, we have spent the past two weeks listening carefully to, and consulting with our community, our fan base and our partners to understand their expectations on the matter.
At the same time, we have worked with authorities in Buffalo, as well as with Randy Lee’s lawyer, to ensure that Randy be granted the due process to which he is entitled. Until now, the Senators had never been made aware of a complaint against Randy, whether before or during his 23-year career with the team. He must be allowed to address the allegations against him through the court system.
That said, the questions that must be answered by Randy are unlikely to be addressed until his next court date – on July 6, 2018 – we believe the best way to live our values and enforce our standards of behaviour is to suspend Randy Lee until the allegations against him are ruled upon by the courts.
The suspension is effective immediately and applies both to Lee’s work with the Ottawa Senators and our AHL team in Belleville.”\
While there is certainly an argument to be made that this should have been the first step taken by the organization when the allegations were first revealed, the saying better late than never seems to apply here.
This means that Randy Lee will not be present when the Senators head to the Draft in Dallas next month.
It’s worth noting that this was day two on the job for the team’s new Chief Operating Officer Nicolas Ruszkowski. It’s also worth noting that his background is in public relations.
