WARNING: This story references sexual assault allegations and may affect those who have experienced sexual violence or know someone affected by it.
A woman said it’s hard to live with the fact that she may have walked “like lamb to a slaughter” into a Toronto condo bedroom where she was then sexually assaulted by Frank Stronach, court heard on Thursday.
The woman, the fourth complainant to testify, is now in her 60s, and said the alleged attack occurred in 1983.
“I just felt powerless,” she said. “It was degrading.”
The 93-year-old founder of auto-parts giant Magna International faces a total of 12 charges, including sexual assault and forcible confinement. Two of the counts, rape and attempted rape, are considered historical charges as they were abolished when the Criminal Code was amended in 1983 to create the offence of sexual assault.
On the fifth day of the trial, under questioning by Crown prosecutor Jelena Vlacic, the woman said her father had known Stronach and that, when she was a university student, her mother arranged for her to get a job at Magna International for the summer.
She said Stronach invited her to dinner at a restaurant near the end of the summer.
She said she was a bit nervous about going because she didn’t know Stronach. But she said she thought it was a nice invitation and that it made sense in the context of Stronach knowing her father.
The woman said she remembered ordering gin and tonic drinks for herself, and while she couldn’t remember how many, she said it “was a lot for me.”
The woman told court that Stronach asked her if she wanted to see the view from his apartment at Harbourfront. She said she felt quite uncomfortable about the invitation, but thought she should go since he had taken her out to dinner and got her a job.
She said when she walked inside, she went to the window to look out at the view.
‘Horrified at what is happening’
The woman testified that Stronach disappeared, but that suddenly he was behind her, putting his arms around her and fondling her breasts.
“I’m horrified at what is happening,” she said. The woman said Stronach was someone she thought was a friend of her father’s, someone who could be trusted.
“I just thought this can’t be real,” she said.
She said somehow from there she ended up in the bedroom facedown on the bed. The woman said that when she gave her initial statement to authorities she told them she had no idea how she got to the bed. But she said that when she thought about it, she must have walked.
“I think my mind just completely doesn’t process that thought that I just … I didn’t fight for my … youth,” she said. “That’s really hard to live with. Like, lamb to a slaughter, you just walk in. “
The woman said “that’s why I don’t know what happened then, because it’s really painful to think that you just did nothing.”
She said she remembered being face down, her cheek pressed against the bed.
The woman said she wasn’t completely naked but Stronach had pulled her trousers down, probably to her thighs.
She said Stronach was behind her, penetrating her vaginally with his penis.
The woman told court that she didn’t say anything while he was assaulting her and was just waiting for it to be over.
She said Stronach drove her home afterward and nothing was said about what had happened.
The woman told court that Stronach suggested he would visit her at her university, which “was absurd.”
“Is he trying to make this sound like what he’s just done is OK? Does he not realize he’s just raped the daughter of his friend?” She said.
The woman said she decided not go to police, that her family did not have the resources and that she has been raised to “keep calm and carry on.”
She said she did see Stronach about four years later, when she asked for him for a reference. She said it was humiliating but that she must have been desperate to get the reference.
The woman said she contacted police in June 2024 after reading an article in The Guardian that Stronach had been charged.
During her testimony, the woman referred to a statement she had given authorities, in which she said she had felt terrified and was just waiting for the alleged assault to be over.
She then referred to a follow-up email she sent after giving that statement, in which she added that she had also been crying during the alleged assault.
“And I think you said I had given inconsistent evidence,” the woman said, referring to Crown prosecutor Vlacic.
At that point, Stronach’s lawyer Leora Shemesh stood up to say she needed to bring a motion, and the court broke for recess.
The issue relates to testimony the woman gave in the morning, where she had referred to a preparatory meeting she had had with the Crown prosecutor and police in January 2026.
The woman testified that at one of the preparatory meetings, she and Vlacic were discussing how she had no idea how she got to the bed the night of the alleged attack and that might have been what Vlacic “called an omission.”
‘Houston, we’ve got a problem’
But Shemesh asked that the complainant to be excused, saying to the court “we’re at that point where I feel like ‘Houston, we’ve got a problem.'”
The problem, Shemesh said, is that the complainant is testifying about the complainant’s discussion with the Crown attorney during a preparatory meeting, in which they’re discussing her omissions. This, Shemesh said, is directly related to the stay of proceedings application she is bringing.
Before the trial began, Shemesh had said she would be asking for the charges against her client to be stayed, arguing that some of the complainants may have been coached during preparatory meetings with the Crown.
Shemesh told the court on Thursday that the Crown was in “sort of an unenviable position” to be asking questions that relate specifically to the Crown herself and her interaction with the complainant before the trial.
“I worry that if we continue to go down this road, that the Crown will undoubtedly be making herself potentially a witness,” Shemesh said.
Superior Court Justice Anne Molloy, who is overseeing the judge-alone trial, said this issue was the reason she had asked the Crown to have a completely separate Crown available and prepped and sitting in the courtroom, in case this issue arose.
“It’s not like this came out of the blue,” Molloy said.
After breaking for a recess, Vlacic asked Molloy to rule about whether she could continue questioning the witness.
Shemesh expressed her concerns that a the end of any stay of preceding application, the crown may choose to call evidence.
“And that would mean that the Crown may … in some scenarios, take off their gowns and get into the witness box.”
Despite this potential conflict , Molloy said she didn’t want to rule on a possible conflict if no conflict emerged. She said she would not be removing Vlacic and that she could continue questioning the witness.
[Shemesh] hasn’t brought a motion to remove you. And I am not removing you. She doesn’t run the courtroom. Nor do you. I do,” she said.
Shemesh, who began cross-examining the woman in late afternoon, will continue on Friday.
