Third Player from 2018 Canada World Juniors Team Granted Leave (UPDATED)

As you know by now, Carter Hart and Dillon Dube are both on a leave of absence from the Flyers and Flames, respectively. Now there’s this:

Per his Swiss League team, Alex Formenton is granted leave and returning to Canada https://t.co/pNdSbOjmUx

— Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) January 24, 2024

Formenton was a Hart and Dube teammate at the 2018 World Juniors. This news comes as reports out of Canada say Ontario police are set to announce charges related to the Hockey Canada sexual assault investigation, which was reopened in 2022.

Rick Westhead tweeted this earlier:

Breaking: Five members of the 2018 world junior hockey team have been told to surrender to London, Ont., police to face charges of sexual assault, The Globe and Mail reports, citing unnamed sources.The Globe reports the players, who have not been charged yet, have been given a…

— Rick Westhead (@rwesthead) January 24, 2024

So look, until Ontario police release the names, this remains speculation. But we’re up to three members of that squad all taking leaves of absence around the same time, so you can understand why people are making an attempt to connect the dots. There’s so much lawyering going on right now that I’m sure the big hockey news breakers are being ultra careful. This is probably going to come down to some official release from London, Ontario police.

Here’s more if you want more info on all of this:

No paywall when you’re in Europe apparently, so here we go: pic.twitter.com/nGKzP8fa4r

— Stat Boy Steven ???????? ???????? ???????? (@StatBoy_Steven) January 24, 2024

EDIT – I’m gonna throw in a clip of Danny Briere reading a prepared statement at Wednesday’s midseason press conference (it’s right off the top):