Daly: Blackhawks lawyers said suit regarding Aldrich had 'no merit' in December

The Chicago Blackhawks' legal team told the NHL in December that a potential lawsuit involving the conduct of former video coach Brad Aldrich had "no merit," deputy commissioner Bill Daly said Monday.

"The first we would have heard of the specific allegations (was) after the civil litigation was filed in May, and then I think there was an amended complaint getting more specific with the allegations," Daly said.

"We were given a heads-up by Chicago team counsel in late December with respect to a potential or threatened civil litigation, to which they claimed to have looked into, and to which they said there was no merit. With respect to being contacted directly by Kyle or his counsel, no, that never happened."

Kyle Beach, then only identified as "John Doe," filed a lawsuit against the Blackhawks on May 7. He said that Aldrich sexually assaulted him in May 2010, when he was a Black Ace, and that the team didn't immediately act on the information after he reported it.

Less than three weeks after Beach submitted his lawsuit, a former high school hockey player in Michigan also sued the Blackhawks. The player says Aldrich sexually assaulted him in 2013, when he was 16, and the Blackhawks provided Aldrich with a reference, failing to inform Aldrich's subsequent employers that there were sexual misconduct allegations against him. Aldrich pleaded guilty to fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a student in Michigan in 2013.

Beach and the former high school player each filed amended complaints in July.

In response to the suits, the Blackhawks commissioned an investigation by law firm Jenner & Block. The investigation report, released Tuesday, revealed that several members of the Blackhawks' senior management group - including then-team president John McDonough, general manager Stan Bowman, head coach Joel Quenneville, and assistant GM Kevin Cheveldayoff - met on May 23, 2010, and discussed allegations that Aldrich had, at minimum, sexually harassed a player.

The Blackhawks did not act on the allegations until June 14 - five days after Chicago won the Stanley Cup - when McDonough told the team's director of human resources, according to the report. On the evening of June 10, Aldrich made an unwanted sexual advance on a Blackhawks intern, the former employee told investigators. The Blackhawks allowed Aldrich to resign without an investigation on June 16.

Bowman and Quenneville resigned from their respective positions in the wake of the report. The NHL didn't discipline Cheveldayoff, now Winnipeg Jets GM, asserting that he wasn't a senior member of the Blackhawks' management group. The club fired McDonough in April 2020.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman also spoke Monday. He defended the league's decisions to fine the Blackhawks $2 million and to allow Quenneville to coach a game for the Florida Panthers on Wednesday night before he met with Bettman on Thursday and subsequently resigned.

Bettman pledged to expand the NHL's hotline for reporting inappropriate conduct to encompass all levels of hockey and not just the league itself.