Woman alleges former Canuck Willie Mitchell sexually assaulted her in 2022

VANCOUVER — A woman has filed a lawsuit against former NHL player Willie Mitchell and a resort in Tofino, B.C., alleging she was sexually assaulted by the one-time Vancouver Canuck while she was “extremely intoxicated.”

The plaintiff, who isn’t named in the lawsuit, says in a civil claim filed in British Columbia Supreme Court on Wednesday that she was employed as a server at Tofino Resort + Marina Inc. in September 2022.

The woman’s claim says the resort was hosting a fishing tournament and after finishing her shift she went to an adjoining pub, where she became “visibly impaired” by alcohol, leaving her with only “fragmented” memories of the evening of Sept. 11, 2022.

The lawsuit says Mitchell escorted her from the pub while she was wearing only one shoe and took her back to his home, where he allegedly “engaged in unprotected sexual activity” with the woman without “express or implied” consent.

The claim says the woman went to police the day after the alleged assault, and then to a local hospital for an examination by a forensic nurse.

“Mitchell’s exploitative intentions were obvious to the plaintiff’s co-workers and their suspicion of Mitchell’s sexual assault of the plaintiff became well known in the local community,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit says Mitchell is 19 years older than the woman, and he was a company director at the resort and a related numbered company up until February 2023.

The allegations in the lawsuit have not been tested in court, and neither Mitchell nor the resort have filed responses in the case, while messages left for resort officials were not immediately returned. Efforts to reach Mitchell or representatives for the companies were also unsuccessful.

The lawsuit says the plaintiff wants the court to consider evidence from one or more other complainants “in light of the similarities between their stories.”

The plaintiff’s lawyer Sandra Kovacs said in an interview Thursday that her client suffered a “serious disruption in her life and a serious decline in her mental health, which is set out in the pleading.”

Kovacs said the RCMP investigated at the time, and while Crown prosecutors declined to lay charges, civil lawsuits can provide “an opportunity to look at how these sorts of events can be prevented by secondary bystanders.”

A message left with an RCMP Island District media relations officer was not immediately returned.

The lawsuit alleges Mitchell was an “agent” of the resort that allegedly over-served her client alcohol.

“This girl ended up with one shoe and all of her belongings left at the bar, and so that speaks to, I say, her level of impairment,” Kovacs said. “And it imports interesting questions into whether or not she truly had the capacity to consent.”

An archived snapshot of Tofino Resort + Marina’s website shows the fishing tournament was cancelled in mid-September 2022.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 2, 2025.