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The Current Transcript for August 27, 2018

Host: Connie Walker

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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VOICE: It's now. It's time to take the stand now and get this thing rolling and bring this prison slavery to a stop.

CONNIE WALKER: That's Kevin Steele, a former inmate in the United States and now a prisoner's rights advocate. He's spreading the word about a prisoners strike that's sweeping across the U.S. Prisoners are on hunger strikes. They're refusing to work and they're trying to raise awareness of what they call modern day slavery inside U.S. jails. First up, we're going inside to hear more about the conditions in prisons on both sides of the border. Then Aymen Derbali made a last minute decision to attend prayers one January night at his Quebec City mosque. Inside he encountered a man with a gun. It was a night that would change everything.

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VOICE: He fired it twice on the roof. I decided to jump to the next pillar to be in his vision and to try to distract him.

CW: Aymen Derbali was shot seven times in the Quebec City mosque massacre, but he lived to tell his story. He shares it with us as part of our documentary, It was a Sunday, in half an hour. Plus, Ken Dryden knows hockey. The former player, politician and author knows why some of his fellow athletes chose to play through the pain of a head injury.

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VOICE: Just as you rise to the occasion to play against the Stanley Cup champion, you rise to the occasion when your head isn't quite right. You focus on what you think is the most important thing at that moment, which is the game.

CW: Ken Dryden is on a mission to get the NHL to change the game and protect its players from head injuries and there are long term consequences. A feature interview with Ken Dryden, in an hour I'm Connie Walker and this is the summer edition of The Current.

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U.S. prison strikes spread to Canada, as advocates call for end to 'prison slavery'

Guests: Amani Sawari, Robert Clark

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[Door opens]

VOICE 1: Nah. Nah. I'm not, I'm not going to eat. Here.

VOICE 2: You're not going to eat?

VOICE 1: Uh, uh.

VOICE 2: Burritos.

VOICE 1: Burritos or not. I'm not eating today.

VOICE 2: No?

VOICE 1: Nah I'm good. Protest.

VOICE 2: Oh you're hunger striking?

VOICE 1: I'm hunger striking right now.

VOICE 2: Alright.

CW: That's Heriberto Garcia, an inmate at California's Folsom County prison and he's on strike. Refusing to eat, as you heard on that video, that he managed to make and share beyond the prison walls. He's one of thousands of prisoners in jails across the U.S. who say they're on strike right now, refusing food, refusing to work and demanding better conditions. Acts of solidarity are even spreading here in Canada. Prisoners in Halifax Burnside jail released a statement of solidarity with U.S. prisoners and their own list of demands. With prisoners striking in at least 17 states, this current movement has the potential to become one of the largest prison demonstrations in U.S. history. It was begun by a group of prisoners' rights advocates known as Jailhouse Lawyers Speak. Amani Sawari is a spokesperson for Jailhouse Lawyers Speak and a prison reform advocate in the United States. She is in Seattle, Washington. Good morning.

AMANI SAWARI: Good morning. Thanks for having me Connie.

CW: Thanks for joining us. Can you help us understand just how widespread these strikes are right now?

AS: Yeah, the strikes are spreading pretty rapidly as prisoners begin to find out through snail mail, through word of mouth, online as well as on television and on the radio. I've had prisoners contact me saying I heard you on the radio. And that's how they find out about the strike. So mainstream media is definitely helping serve the prisoners and get this out there more so that more prisoners can participate and it is spreading pretty rapidly due to that.

CW: Can you tell us exactly where it's happening and which inmates. What kind of inmates are taking part in this?

AS: Yeah. So inmates throughout the country are participating in the strike. There are hundreds participating in South Carolina, as well as there are hundreds participating in Tacoma Washington's detention center. We've only been able to get reports from those prisoners that have direct access to speaking about it, whether that be online or by phone or through a letter. So those confirmed reports that we have, while there are just the ones like Heriberto, who are able to report on their own due to their own access to online. Those are the reports that we've gotten in these first few days of the strike, but as we move on through the weeks to come, we'll get definitely more reports. Prison officials are definitely going on lockdown and putting all the force on that they can and threatening retaliation on prisoners. So it is really difficult to tell where exactly the strikes are happening at this time.

CW: Why are the prisoners striking right now?

AS: So their ten demands that Jailhouse Lawyers Speak came out with: demands for improved conditions and an interprison slavery are just the first two, but there are eight more. They want to see a recession to the Prison Litigation Reform Act that bars prisoners from being able to have access to the courts. Because of thip Prisoners aren't able to have their civil rights protected or their human rights protected because internal estimations on their grievances are usually done by the ones who did abuse them or people who are directly connected to the people who abused them.

CW: So if they have a complaint in a prison, then that is handled directly by the prison and there's not necessarily an outside advocate.

AS: Right. Exactly and there's no monitoring force of the prisons at all in the United States. It's just monitored by their internal systems, their internal investigations. They also want to see a recession of truth in sentencing acts, which demand that prisoners have a minimum sentence. We've seen minimum sentences sweep across the country and in states like Michigan their in term indeterminate sentences that could range 20 year time spans. So prisoners really don't know when they'll get out and these types of acts do really devoid prisons of hope or opportunity. They also want to see an end to the racial overcharging and over sentencing and parole denials of black and brown humans. They want to see an immediate end to racist gang enhancements, which is just when prisoners are incarcerated and they are confirmed to be associated in a gang, whether that be because of their last name or someone that they were in a picture with or the high school that they went to was in a gang area or it could be completely arbitrary, the tattoo markings on their body. Then they're automatically added with this extra time and then given this label that further dehumanizes them while they're incarcerated. They also want to. Yes?

CW: You mentioned that they were trying to raise awareness about modern day slavery inside U.S. jails. What is the situation?

AS: So modern day slavery is the act of forcing someone to work for little to nothing. We see that prisoners are earning less than two dollars a day for really hard backbreaking labour. Things like firefighting. They're only earning two dollars a day and these skills and qualifications, officials will say, oh well they're learning skills that they can use on the outside. Well in the example of the California prisoners that are fighting fires, they're not even permitted to become firefighters when they get out. So these obviously aren't skills that they're developing to use on the outside. It's just abuse of someone's time and abuse of their situation of being a prisoner and they're doing this work that's very dangerous. That's deadly, but they're willing to do it because the other alternative is sitting in a jail cell and anything is better than that even fighting a fire that could kill you. So prisoners are doing this type of work, as well as remedial work for third party companies that will come in and exploit prisoners labor. They'll pay a prisoner ten cents an hour for what they could have paid a person on the outside for minimum wage. And if these same jobs were offered to people on the outside for minimum wage then those people most likely would not have ended up incarcerated. So it's really just an abuse of the populations that end up in prison due to the lack of resources that are offered to them when they're outside.

CW: So we heard a clip from Heriberto Garcia in Folsom County Prison in California. He's on a hunger strike. But what are some of the other actions that prisoners are taking in the jails?

AS: So there are multiple actions that prisoners can take depending on their location or their status as a prisoner. Work stoppages is the first call and that is for prisoners to just not go into work, to refuse to work. And this is a direct response to the prison slavery problem and it is blatant prison slavery. It's not just you know so-called slavery, it is called slavery in our constitution. It's not just called that by prisoners. The government calls it slavery and that's exactly what it is. So some prisoners don't have access to working at a job, they might not have that privilege. So another way that they can participate is through sit ins and so this is when a group of prisoners gather together and sit in a common area peacefully and refuse to move. And then some prisoners don't have access to being in general population, so they can participate through boycotts, which is just the refusal to spend money. Any money that a prisoner will spend on the inside does support the system, whether that be on their health care, their dental care, whether that be on hygiene products, hair products, cosmetic products, food, commissary items, clothes, jackets, anything that they would spend money on. They are refusing to do so, even phone calls for the next two and a half weeks and then some prisoners don't even have the privilege of having access to talking on the phone, buying commissary items like we saw with Heriberto. He is in solitary confinement. So he would not be able to participate in a sit in or a work stoppage or a boycott. So one way that all prisoners can participate is through hunger strikes and depending on where they are and where their location is, they're always going to be served food and they have the right to deny that food and that's how they can participate.

CW: And how are the prisons responding to this action? I understand several of the states are denying that these strikes are even occurring.

AS: Yeah. So that's one thing that prisons are doing. They're going on lockdown and a lockdown is really just no movement, no activity within a prison. That's one way that prisoners are trying to intimidate prisoners from participating, but this is actually fueling prisoners want to participate. Another way that officials are responding is by like you said denying that these actions are happening, which is really just blatant evidence of the criminal justice system's lack of concern for the humanity of the individuals that they are responsible to protect and to serve. Yes. Officials are supposed to be protecting the inmates that they are over and when prison officials deny prisoners actions for their human rights, then it really is just you know blatant disrespect on all levels. But we are confirming these actions ourselves through videos like Heriberto, through mail, through images that are posted. Prisoners are confirming these actions theirselves and as supporters of them, we need to support their word on what they are doing because the government has a completely different agenda.

CW: Sorry Amani, we have to leave it there, but thank you very much for joining us.

AS: Thank you.

CW: Amani Sawari is a spokesperson for Jailhouse Lawyer Speak and a prison reform advocate in the United States. She is in Seattle, Washington. As I mentioned, the U.S. prisoners' strike has inspired at least one action in a Canadian institution. Inmates at the Burnside jail in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia say they're on strike and they've released a statement explaining themselves through El Jones. She is a prison reform advocate and a former poet laureate of Halifax.

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VOICE: We, the prisoners of Burnside, are unified across the population in non-violent peaceful protest. We believe that it is only through collective action that change will be made. We recognise that the staff in the jail are workers who are also facing injustice. We are asking for a more productive rehabilitative environment that supports the wellbeing of everyone in the system. These policy changes will also benefit the workers in the jail. Our voices should be considered in the programming of policies for this jail. The changes we are demanding for our conditions are reasonable and must happen to support our human rights. The organizers of this protest assert that we are being warehouses inmate. Bot treated as human beings. We join in this protest in solidarity with our brothers imprisonined in the United States and we join their call for justice.

CW: They list tem demands including improved healthcare, rehabilitation programs, food quality and air circulation. The Nova Scotia Correctional Services responded to the statement with one of its own. It reads in part, "The Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility is operating as usual. Demonstrations or protests of any kind are not taking place. Correctional Services provides healthy food to inmates and respects any cultural dietary needs. The current renovations include a new air ventilation system." That is from Nova Scotia Correctional Services. The calls for prison reform in Canada extend well beyond that one institution. Robert Clark is a former deputy warden for Correctional Service Canada. He worked in corrections for 30 years in seven different prisons. He's the author of the book, Down Inside: Thirty Years in Canada's Prison Service. And he joins me from Kingston, Ontario. Good morning.

ROBERT CLARK: Yes. Hello, Connie.

CW: Robert, what do you think of this prisoner protest to demand better conditions?

RC: Well truthfully, I'm not very surprised. I'm glad to see it's a organized peaceful demonstration. Of course, but with the conditions that exist within the prison system right now, something like this certainly could have been expected.

CW: I want to pick up on one line from the Nova Scotia inmate statement. Their perception that they are "warehoused and not treated as human beings." What's your reaction to that as somebody who spent 30 years in corrections?

RC: I would say that's by and large true. It's unfortunate to say, but the number of staff in our penal institutions who are compassionate and hardworking and dedicated to rehabilitation is actually a small percentage of the total workforce. My experience was that the vast majority of people who work in prisons are extremely indifferent to the prisoners plight and have almost no interest in individuals in terms of their potential to return to the community as law-abiding citizens.

CW: So what does that plight? Give us a glimpse of inside. You know when an inmate doesn't feel like he or she is being treated as a human being, how are they being treated?

RC: Well as I describe in my book, I refer to it as a culture of collective indifference. And what this means is that if a prisoner is having a problem for instance getting access to a program or getting out of solitary confinement or getting a pay raise that was due six months ago, they will often verbally approach people who are in positions to solve these problems and get no assistance at all. They'll then put in written request forms for resolution and see nothing come of those, often including no response whatsoever. So they then go to the grievance process and when they find the grievance process brings them no responses, they start to get very, very frustrated. You can imagine what it must be like to be comfined and reliant on other people 24 hours a day to manage small things and when you get almost zero assistance, it can really cause the temperature inside of prison to rise because everyone's kind of experiencing the same thing.

CW: What are the consequences of that?

RC: Well you know, it's unfortunate. My experience is that when small problems arise like this in prison, those of us who know the signs and the symptoms will react quickly. And that includes having arranged meetings with prisoners. Face to face contact betweem staff and the inmate population, to find out what's really going on. Small things need to be solved, while they're still small. As I've said in my book, once it gets out of your control, once the inmates decide to take action themselves collectively, there's no more opportunity to talk to defuse the situation. And so when these things go ignored, I watch with trepidation because I know the consequences.

CW: Well you've had to deal with a riot, lockdowns, prisoner murders and suicides. Did you feel equipped and resourced to handle all of that?

RC: Well at that time, I did. It's a different kind of system now. When I entered the system and for most of my career, I still took the approach of dynamic security. That is going and talking to people face to face and I always encouraged the staff to do the same thing. As I've said, my experience is that prisons are much safer when the staff and the prisoners have a lot of face to face contact because it allows for rapport to be built. Some rapport and then there's more communication. But the prisons of today have moved away from dynamic security and now relying on static security, which is close circuit security cameras, electric barriers on the cells. So the prisoners have much less contact with staff with whom they can discuss their problems and their concerns.

CW: How did it, I mean in your view, how did it get to be like this in prisons? Like what's causing this situation?

RC: Well I wish I knew, you know, because there's so many evidence-based successes going on around the world where rehabilitation is the focus. Where dynamic security can be seen every day working successfully to run their institutions, humanely and professionally. But our system seems to have slipped into this malaise, where there's just, it doesn't seem to be anybody wants to jump up and say let's really get into some positive change. It just seems like they're OK with the way it's going with the status quo and I really can't understand it.

CW: Do you see any impact or do you draw a direct line from the government's tougher laws on crime having an impact?

RC: Well we did see an increase in inmate populations during the tough on crime agenda, as well as an increase in things like solitary confinement and double bunking. And I am clearly opposed to that kind of approach for some of the reasons that I've just cited. But my experience is that when jails or prisons become overcrowded and there's less room for privacy, once again you start to see the temperature go up and you'll see the same signs, as well. You'll see a restlessness and a frustration within the population. You'll see an increase in grievances and complaints and these kinds of things should be taken as signs that it's time to step in and do something.

CW: And I mean after 30 years in corrections, I mean, do you see this as a problem that is getting worse? Do you think that the conditions that we're seeing in U.S. prisons are also happening outside of Nova Scotia and Canada?

RC: Well I can't really compare the two systems because I have very little knowledge of the U.S. other than to know that it's you know appears to be firmly rooted in secure custody. Ours is getting closer to that, unfortunately.

CW: We're running out of time, so I'm going to have to leave it there, but thank you very much for joining us today.

RC: Well thank you very much.

CW: Thank you, Robert. Robert Clark is a former deputy warden for Correctional Service Canada and the author of the book, Down Inside: Thirty Years in Canada's Prison Service. We reached him in Kingston, Ontario. The CBC News is next. Then the Quebec City mosque attack of 2017 changed the lives of many. For Aymen Derbali, who was shot seven times, it left him paralyzed. His story in our documentary after the news. I'm Connie Walker and you're listening to the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

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Paralyzed survivor of Quebec mosque attack is still fighting to find peace

Guests: Aymen Derbali

CW: Hello. I'm Connie Walker and you're listening to the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

CW: Still to come, every year we learn more about the long term consequences of concussions in sports and yet, professional leagues seem slow to act. That bothers hockey great Ken Dryden, who's calling on his sport to get with the program.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Football is a real challenge about what the heck you do with head injuries in football. In hockey there are absolutely answers about what you do. It doesn't take much, it wouldn't take much.

CW: Ken Dryden on protecting players and the game, in half an hour. And in just a moment, we bring you our documentary about the impact of the mosque shooting in Quebec City on one family. But first, any middle children out there?

[Music]

CW: Well Anna Maria Tremonti will be back here in the host chair starting next week. And she and the team are hard at work lining up a new season of stories for you including this one, which just might have a special meaning to anyone who knows what it's like to be in the middle. As a middle child that is. Jan Brady, Danny Partridge, Lisa Simpson are just a few famous pop culture examples of what it means to be a middle child, but middle children may be going extinct. Today, nearly two thirds of families have only one or two kids. So we'll explore just what it means to be a middle child and what it means that middle children are on the decline.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: August 12th is Middle Child's Day. I did not invent Middle Child's Day. I came across it while I was doing research for a book I'm writing about being a middle child. And the irony of having a holiday for middle children that nobody pays any attention to was kind of inescapable to me. So I thought it would be fun to try to raise awareness for Middle Child's Day. You know we never say we get enough attention. At least that one day a year, we could all hope to get attention. It's become more important with this recent news about our possible extinction. I don't know how many more middle child's days we'll have. So I figure we should try to make the most of them.

VOICE 2: People can always point out a specific example of a middle child, who perhaps is the problem child. My favorite one is usually Charlie Sheen because he certainly had some adventurous times. One of the traits that was listed in one survey was neglected. And the only birth order that got that was middle children. Well what I see is that, so they grew up in a home where they've sort of had to a certain extent, negotiate for what they want. They've had to be a little bit more independent, so they've learned skills related to that and they take those out with them into the rest of the world. Right. It's sort of like a training ground for the rest of your life.

VOICE 1: My mother did have this poem. She taped it to the kitchen wall, it was called, "The Middle Child" and it was a lovely poem about all the special things that middle children did. And I did wonder, that's odd. How come there's no poem there about my brother, the firstborn or how come there's no poem there about my sister, the last born? Is there something wrong with me? Is there something wrong with being a middle child? They say that first borns have certain similar qualities. They say that last borns have certain similar qualities. How come they weren't given this disease like sounding syndrome. I think we grow up with we're told, we have middle child syndrome.

VOICE 2: I understand that may be a pervasive idea and that lots of people might buy into it, but I don't think there is any scientific evidence to suggest that children of different birth orders actually have different personalities.

VOICE 1: I went back and found my birth announcement, which I call my birth denouncement. My birth announcement read Dr. and Mrs. Marvin Hotman announced the arrival of Michael David's brother, Bruce Steven. So I didn't even get top billing on my own birth announcement.

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CW: Well if you're a middle child or have some thoughts about your children or siblings who are in the middle, you'll want to catch that. The Current's new season kicks off next week with Anna Maria Tremonti.

[Music]

CW: You're listening to the summer edition of The Current. I'm Connie Walker. The evening of January 29th, 2017, started out as a cold quiet Sunday night, like any other in Quebec City. But then, out of nowhere, the peace was shattered by an attack that left nothing the same again. A gunman strode into a mosque and within minutes six worshippers were dead and a dozen more injured. Aymen Derbali was there that night to pray and a split second decision there forever altered his life. The attack left him in a coma for months and unable to walk again. In January of this year, we brought you Aymen's story in a documentary by journalist Susana Ferreira. Here once again it is, "It Was A Sunday."

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[Sound: in rehab]

SUSANA FERREIRA: I meet Aymen Derbali at his physical therapy session at the Institut de réadaptation en déficience physique de Québec or the réadaptation Institut. He is with his physiotherapist Nathalie Roberge, and they're doing a set of exercises. He's on a hard bed. He's using his arms. He's using a great deal of effort in his upper body strength to try and move one leg at a time to the side, and with each movement he counts himself down to it. One, two, three, move. One, two, three, move. Aymen's physiotherapy session is gruelling. So I asked him, how he steals himself for the day ahead.

AYMEN DERBALI: Toast, coffee—I use it to eat chocolate too.

VOICE 1: For breakfast?

AYMEN DERBALI: In the breakfast, yes.

VOICE 1: The chocolate in the breakfast?

AYMEN DERBALI: Yes [laughs]. A little bit. Not a lot.

VOICE 1: I thought I was giving you energy [laughs].

SUSANA FERREIRA: Despite the trauma and incredible hardships of this past year, Aymen is warm and he has a great smile.

AYMEN DERBALI: I'm trying all the time to do my best, to do some new physical movements that I wasn't able to do before July—like releasing for example the wheelchair breaks by myself. The most difficult thing—my right arm pain [unintelligible] which affect my nerve, the nerve. Now I'm controlling this pain, and I'm not afraid of having pain.

SUSANA FERREIRA: So Aymen came to Canada in 2001 from Tunisia. He's an IT specialist, and he's led a very interesting life. He's lived in multiple countries. He speaks Arabic, French, English, and Spanish. He's done humanitarian work in Canada and abroad. He's married. And he and his wife have three children together—two boys and one girl.

AYMEN DERBALI: This is a peaceful city. We were living in peace. I was used to work and to look after my children, my wife, and my house. So like everybody, we have a simple life.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Aymen's life has changed dramatically. His physiotherapist, Nathalie Roberge, says he is a tetraplegic. He's lost the use of his legs. But he's got partial use of his arms. He's been living here at this réadaptation Institut since July.

AYMEN DERBALI: I wasn't able to move any part of my body. This feeling was very difficult for me. My hope is that I will gain some physical facilities and I will be back to live with my family in a new house.

SUSANA FERREIRA: One of the first things he wanted to do when he arrived here was to return to the mosque. He felt that it was important that he go back there.

AYMEN DERBALI: Yes, it was really important for me to go back and to pray. It was a really emotional.

[Sound: Prayers]

SUSANA FERREIRA: This is the Centre Culturel Islamique de Québec. This is the mosque where one year ago today, Aymen was shot seven times, and where six men he calls brothers were killed.

[Sound: Prayers]

AYMEN DERBALI: I remember all of the people screaming.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Aymen tells me that he wasn't sure whether he was going to go to a prayer that night. It was a Sunday. He'd come home with his family. He was busy.

AYMEN DERBALI: I was programming a TV for my child. And I saw my watch and it was 7:30 o'clock. So I was wondering if I have enough time because I knew that the prayer started at 7:30. After wondering a while, I decided to go.

SUSANA FERREIRA: So he got in his car and he drove to mosque. And it was a very cold evening—much the same as it is right now.

AYMEN DERBALI: I went quickly to be able to pray with a...

SUSANA FERREIRA: What he didn't know was that an attack was already underway. There were already two men who had been shot just outside the mosque.

AYMEN DERBALI: I didn't hear anything, so I entered.

SUSANA FERREIRA: And when he got inside, he took off his shoes, and that's when he noticed that things weren't quite right.

AYMEN DERBALI: I saw people standing up, and they were debating in the same place.

SUSANA FERREIRA: The worshippers were clustered strangely together and he didn't understand why.

AYMEN DERBALI: I found that very strange. But I didn't think it was an attack or something like that.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Until he looked over and he saw a man to his left.

AYMEN DERBALI: But I didn't see his gun.

SUSANA FERREIRA: The man had his back turned to him, and he started firing shots.

AYMEN DERBALI: He fired twice at the roof.

SUSANA FERREIRA: And this is when something in Aymen clicked into place. Something was very wrong and he needed to do something.

AYMEN DERBALI: I was surprised. I decided at that moment...

SUSANA FERREIRA: Let me catch his attention. So the mosque itself—the men's prayer room is a large open area. But there are pillars.

AYMEN DERBALI: I decided to jump to the next pillar to be in his vision and to try to distract him.

SUSANA FERREIRA: And he started to lunge at him, to act as though he was going to attack, to really capture this man's attention.

AYMEN DERBALI: Because all the people, they're in front of him. So if he fired in my direction, he will not kill anybody because I have the wall behind me.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Aymen told me that he looked in his eyes and he could see that he was nervous.

AYMEN DERBALI: He saw me and he decided to fire.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Aymen got shot. He got shot...

AYMEN DERBALI: In my leg. The other one in my chin. And two bullets in my abdomen. Yes, in my abdomen.

SUSANA FERREIRA: He fell down and he started to black out.

AYMEN DERBALI: That moment I was unconscious. I was unconscious. Some brothers who were still there didn't escape. They told that he fired me on the ground. Fired me like three times to be sure that I am dead. After that, I woke up and I hear a lot of people screaming. Police and ambulances. 'We need help! We need help!' Some brothers they told make the [unintelligible] intention before..

[Sound: Sirens]

SUSANA FERREIRA: One of the other men at the mosque was yelling at him, 'Aymen, stay with us! Stay with us!'

AYMEN DERBALI: ‘Stay with us, stay with us, open your eyes, stay with us, open your eyes, Aymen, open your eyes, open your eyes!' So I opened my eyes

SUSANA FERREIRA: And he saw a police officer. He saw a uniform. He heard more screaming, and he closed his eyes again.

AYMEN DERBALI: I remember...

VOICE 1: We're learning more about what happened Sunday night during the attack at the Quebec City mosque. Police sources told Radio-Canada the suspected gunman, Alexandre Bissonnette, approached the mosque with two firearms. One was a long gun. The other 9–mm handgun registered in his name.

SUSANA FERREIRA: On Saturdays and Sundays Aymen goes home to visit his family at their fourth floor apartment. And on this particular Saturday, I accompany him to his building and his wife Nedra buzzes us in.

[Sound: Non-English speaking language]

SUSANA FERREIRA: We're waiting for the elevator and the elevator doors open in, and two of us kids come out.

[Sound: Children playing]

SUSANA FERREIRA: It's Youssouf and Ayoub. I walk into the apartment and I'm greeted by Nedra, Aymen's wife. And she's holding Maryem—their daughter—who's almost two-years-old. It's like a smallish apartment. It's not huge. They've definitely had to shuffle around their furniture. There are couches all along one wall and then there is a hospital bed in a corner and he doesn't sleep there at night, but it's there in case he needs to lie down because he can't get his wheelchair into the bedroom. Above the couches on one of the walls, there is a photo of Aymen before the attack. He's standing and holding one of his children in his arms—beaming with joy.

[Sound: Non-English speaking language, dips into translation]

TRANSLATION: My name is Nedra Zahouani. I'm the wife of Aymen Derbali. I am a housewife. I have three kids. That's everything.

SUSANA FERREIRA: A year is not very much time to heal from what they've gone through. It's still very raw for her.

TRANSLATION: It was a Sunday. Around 8 p.m., I got a call from my neighbour. She asked, "Is Aymen there?" I said, "No. he's at the mosque." I thought she needed me. She said, "No. there was an attack." When she said that word, it like I was paralyzed. I was in shock. People kept calling. People were saying Aymen was dead. People were saying he was badly injured.

SUSANA FERREIRA: She tried to figure out what hospital he was in. And finally by 8:30 she found him. He was alive, but he was in critical condition.

TRANSLATION: The doctor said that Aymen—when he got to the hospital—he had a blood pressure reading of zero. Already the first miracle was that he was still alive after having blood pressure readings of zero. He said he was in critical condition. He had been in surgery for nine hours. When I saw him—I couldn't. Aymen went into cardiac arrest four times. It wasn't easy for me and I was all alone. One doctor suggested we unplug the machine and I didn't accept that. The bullets touched his spinal cord. He couldn't move his arms or his legs. He told me he couldn't come home—he would spend his life in the hospital. Even when he put it like that, I accepted that. The important thing for me was that he stayed with us. Thanks to God, we are truly lucky—me and my kids. He's still alive with us.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Aymen opened his eyes almost two months later.

AYMEN DERBALI: I woke up...

SUSANA FERREIRA: And his wife was there.

TRANSLATION: I was with him all of the time.

AYMEN DERBALI: I asked her how many times I was unconscious. She told me around months. I said, "It was just like I slept one night.

TRANSLATION: Aymen has an association to help the poor, to help orphans...

SUSANA FERREIRA: And when he woke up the first thing he asked her about was...

TRANSLATION: Are really orphans being taken care of? It was very moving for me.

SUSANA FERREIRA: When he woke up he had recurring nightmares. He couldn't get the screaming out of his mind and he couldn't help thinking about the six men who had died. Some of them were very close to him.

AYMEN DERBALI: I couldn't sleep. I was hearing all the time screaming. [Unintelligible] I was asking myself I didn't catch him on the back? Why I didn't do a return and catch him?

SUSANA FERREIRA: And it took a while for him to work to forgive himself.

AYMEN DERBALI: And I said after that those are seconds. All the people are surprised to hear this—terrifying sound. After I said I did what it was the most suitable thing for that moment for me.

TRANSLATION: He's brave. It's not only him, the entire family is holding out hope. For us we can't stay stuck here that's for sure. Whether he's in a chair or on his legs, nothing has changed for us. Aymen is Aymen. And we love him very much.

SUSANA FERREIRA: Back at the mosque, if you're walking in for the first time, it's hard to imagine that a massacre took place here. But if you look closely there are still some signs. Mosque members tell me that there are still two bullets in one of the walls. They haven't been or moved. They also tell me that the shoes of the men who were killed that day are still in the same place. No one has touched them. Security has been heightened. Members have been assigned to key to get in and out.

AYMEN DERBALI: All of the victims and all of the community, we have received help from across Canada, the United States, and around the world. So we didn't feel like we are alone in this event—in this tragedy.

SUSANA FERREIRA: The community has always been close he tells me. But since the attack..

AYMEN DERBALI: More warm relationship after the attack. We feel like one body. A lot of sisters have helped my wife in preparing meals. My son, Ayoub, he's always asking her—his mother—when I will be back.

But, luckily here, I have a lot of friends. So they took him to his activities.

[Sound: Prayers]

AYMEN DERBALI: I know it's not easy to pass through this event. Our life has changed since that moment, but I have to be strong. You know this is destiny. I am lucky to be still alive, too see my family. So this is life. It's our destiny, so we have to accept it. And we have to try to see all the good things instead of, in spite of saying bad things.

[Sound: Adhan plays. Sound of prayers]

That was Susana Ferreira's documentary, "It Was A Sunday." It first aired last January on The Current. The Current's documentary editor is Joan Weber. Thanks to Current producer, Pacinthe Mattar who voiced, in English, the words of Nedra Zahaoui. A fundraiser to help the Derbali family buy a wheelchair accessible home, raised more than $400,000. Meanwhile, Alexandre Bissonnette pleaded guilty to six charges of first-degree murder and six of attempted murder. His trial wrapped up in June. The judge's sentence is expected this fall. Prosecutors have asked the judge for a life sentence with no chance of parole for 150 years, the most severe sentence available in Canada. Coming up in our next half hour, hockey great Ken Dryden, looks at the life and death of NHL'er Steve Montador and calls on the NHL commissioner Gary Bettman to make some changes to the game. I'm Connie Walker and you're listening to the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

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'Concussions affect a life': Ken Dryden wants hockey rules changed to save players' lives

Guests: Ken Dryden

CW: I'm Connie Walker and you're listening to the summer edition of The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Former NHL defenseman, Steve Montador has died. Police say it was of natural causes, but because he was only 35, there will be an autopsy. Montador played for six teams, over ten seasons, but was permanently sidelined by a concussion three years ago.

CW: That's how it sounded on the CBC News, back in February 2015. Within the year, Steve Montador's family would sue the National Hockey League. They alleged that the NHL had failed to keep Steve safe and crucially, that they failed to inform him about the long term effects of brain trauma. Steve Montador had Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE. It's a lethal disease linked to concussions sustained through years of play and as it has in the NFL, CTE has taken a devastating toll on NHL'ers. Ken Dryden is a legend of that league. He is a six-time Stanley Cup winner with the Montreal Canadiens, a former president of the Toronto Maple Leafs and a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame. But he's got some tough questions for the league and its commissioner Gary Bettman. Ken Dryden's latest book is titled, "Game Change: The Life and Death of Steve Montador and the Future of Hockey." He joined Anna Maria Tremonti in October.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: How was it confirmed that Steve Montador had CTE?

KEN DRYDEN: It was a couple of months later that almost immediately his brain was donated to a researcher named Dr. Lily Hazrati. And there's a process that takes some time before the actual examination can take place. But within a couple of months that whole process, you know, was complete. And with the cuttings of the brain of the slides that are created, and finally for Lily to look into her microscope she saw the CTE.

AMT: You need an autopsy to be certain.

KEN DRYDEN: You do. There is not any way of determining that now.

AMT: What was life like for Steve in the year before his death?

KEN DRYDEN: It wasn't a good life the year before. And that's one of the things that is so much a part of the story, is that concussions affect a life. They don't just affect the ability to play a sport, but what happens when you're away from the ice or away from the field. What is your day like? And Steve was experiencing a lot of the symptoms that people with head injuries have, memory problems, anxiety, depression, difficulty of focusing, difficulty in terms of making decisions, and putting the pieces together and sorting things out. And so in the end it was really a lousy life, and a lousy life lived at the age 35. And the kind of thing that, you know, all of us or most of us at some point may experience in people who are very much older. And you kind of come to not accept it and not be happy with it, but understand that somebody who is older than 80 or 85 may have a dementia or Alzheimer’s or something, and have those kinds of problems. But you don't expect it in somebody 35.

AMT: And also he was just experiencing that withdrawal from a career. Really a career that he had really had, you know, since earliest childhood.

KEN DRYDEN: He had played all of his life. That hockey life had been at the core of what he had been doing since he was five or six-years-old. And so there is this transition when you are not around, you know, doing something that you know and you know that you're good at and you get your satisfactions from, and you can get down and you can get depressed and you can start, you know, using alcohol more often, and there's lots of lots of examples of all of that. And so it's very easy at that particular moment, for even Steve, let alone his friends, let alone family, let alone others, just start saying to themselves it's a problem of transition. That's what it is, it's transition. Well one of the saddest parts of the whole thing is that Steve died thinking it was all his fault.

AMT: Mm.

KEN DRYDEN: Because this was, you know, that he could have prevented this kind of stuff, this downward spiral. As opposed to really his brain had been affected and he was becoming a different person.

AMT: Before all of that what kind of person was he?

KEN DRYDEN: He, [chuckles] he's somebody who absolutely sort of lit up a room. And one, he was a good looking guy, but he had a kind of physicality and charm to him and he was smart. I mean, he was somebody who pretty early on realized he could be an experiencer, he could do almost anything, go almost anywhere, in part because he was a hockey player. That he had been you know a kid who played junior hockey Well you're a star if you're playing junior hockey and you can in the local town you're a star. So, you know, you can kind of do anything and meet anybody. Well then the local town becomes a bigger city and a bigger stage. And Steve was smart enough early on enough in his life to realize that he had the time, in the summers he had the money that he was making as a player, that if he was interesting and experiencing things he could do it.

AMT: How would you describe him as a hockey player?

KEN DRYDEN: He was probably never the best defenseman on even his minor hockey teams. He wasn't in junior, he went undrafted in the NHL draft. He was signed as a free agent by Calgary. He spent two years in St. John playing for the Calgary farm team there, and then gradually played a few games in the NHL and then more games. But he was what is described as a five six defenseman. The one two defensemen, they're the stars. They're the ones who play on powerplays, kill penalties, play 25 minutes a game. Then there are the three four defensemen, who are sort of solid, solid offensively, solid defensively. They'll play 20 minutes a game. The five six defensemen play about 15 minutes a game. And the challenge of a five six defenseman is that you're not far away from being a seven defenseman. And the seven defenseman is the is the healthy scratch, is the one who doesn't play, or the eighth defenseman who is now down in the minors. So you're always kind of on the edge of things, but at the same time every team including Stanley Cup winning teams has five six defensemen on their team. And Steve, you know, made a career out of being a five six defenseman. He played over 570 games over ten seasons, and was somebody who his teammates would say he was a great teammate. You know, that they loved him being around the team and he loved being around the team.

AMT: I have a clip from the 2004 Western Conference Finals between the Calgary Flames and the San Jose Sharks. Let's listen to that.

SOUNDCLIP

ANNOUNCER: Here’s Iginla.

[Sound: slapping stick sound]

ANNOUNCER: Jarome Iginla looking for a chance. Coming late, Montador.

[Sound: crowd cheering]

ANNOUNCER: Scores. Steve Montador is your hero in game one. As the Flames strike first in the Western Conference Final. His first ever Stanley Cup playoff goal. And he’ll never forget it.

AMT: Ken Dryden, tell me about that goal and what it meant for Steve Montador?

KEN DRYDEN: Well it was the beyond dream goal. So this was really his first full season in the NHL, but he played maybe only about half the games. And so the playoffs begin, and Calgary had not made the playoffs for a few years and they started the season not well. And then they got hot. And so they ended up making the playoffs. The playoffs began, and Steve wasn't dressed. Well then an injury happened and he played in the seventh game of the first round and played regularly from that point on. And Calgary started on this run and they kept knocking off teams that had finished higher than they did in the regular season. And they find themselves in the conference finals against San Jose and [chuckles] it’s in over time. And Steve Montador is not a big scorer, and it's in overtime. And Jarome Iginla the star for Calgary, was carrying the puck into the San Jose zone and San Jose was making a change and all of a sudden Steve saw open ice and so he headed towards the net. And as the announcers sort of described later, he started slapping his stick on the ice like he was slapping a beavertail on the ice. I mean and the coach Darryl Sutter said you could hear him all the way to Sacramento. He wanted that puck. And so the pass was made, he went in all alone and he scored. And interesting in that clip, and of where Chris Cuthbert talks about how it's something that he'll never forget. Yes, that was absolutely true. But what was also true is his teammates never forgot it either. When I talked to them who played on that team Rhett Warrener, Jamie McClennan had gone by that time, Marty Gélina, they remember that moment so vividly because they had such an affection for Steve. And it was like, it was the goal that went in, but it was the look on his face, it was the look on his eyes, it was just total joy. And it’s something that they have never forgotten either.

AMT: It just underlines what you said about him being such a great teammate. They loved him.

KEN DRYDEN: Yeah. Yeah, they really did.

AMT: Do we know how many concussions he sustained during his time in the league?

KEN DRYDEN: No. And nor even before that time. I mean, before in minor hockey, and as I try to get at in the book, you know, that it's probable that he had his first around the age of 12. And then maybe a couple of more in minor hockey, and then in the NHL. One of the hardest things to read is that when, you know, that when you get a blow to the head sometimes it's from a puck or from a stick and there is a cut. And so all the attention goes to the cut. I mean, that oh he got this bad cut over his eye, and so the treatment is on that. Well it just so happens that he feels pretty lousy and he feels lousy for a week or ten days. And that in fact the more significant injury may well have been the blow rather than the cut. And so he had a few documented concussions and others that may have been, and again if you're a player, and Steve, you know, when he went started seeing doctors and they would ask him his history, they would always refer to it as as he a very unreliable historian for his own, you know, past. And because you don't pay much attention to it. I mean, if you're a player you play, you know that's what you do. You see an injury as another opponent. And so you've got to find a way of rising to the challenge of that opponent. And the way you do it is you kind of forget about the obstacle, which is the injury.

AMT: So is that why he would go to the rink day after day even when he was injured?

KEN DRYDEN: It's in part. I mean, it's one of the challenges in terms of dealing with any player. I mean, you know, Steve was that way. But Steve, you know, in most ways wasn't different from the vast majority of players. Is you want to play, you feel like you need to play, your teammates need you. The circumstances of the game need that, your coaches depending on you. The fans want you to play. And it's part of your own pride that you play. And again, it's another opponent. And so just as you rise to the occasion to play against the Stanley Cup champion, you rise to the occasion when your knee isn't quite right, or your shoulder isn't quite right, or your head isn't quite right. And you see beyond the injury, you focus on what you think is the most important thing at that moment, which is the game and of delivering the game. And we're all pretty good at cutting off most of those other symptoms. And one of the things that happens with all of these players is that in a sense they realize they have this choice. Do I want to feel lousy between the hours of 7:30 at night and 11:00 at night at home and not playing, or do I want to play, where I can forget myself during those hours, I'm not focused on how lousy I feel. I am playing. I get three hours worth of relief and release by playing. So you go out and play.

AMT: So it becomes a circle.

KEN DRYDEN: That's right.

AMT: Yeah, yeah. Well for the NHL and fans, not all concussions in hockey carry the same kind of concerns for the player who is injured. I have a clip from the 2011 Winter Classic game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Washington Capitals. Listen to this.

SOUNDCLIP

ANNOUNCER 1: Here's Crosby, just getting into position. Did he turn and get hit, oh, yeah.

ANNOUNCER 2: Oh did he ever. Steckel got him.

ANNOUNCER 1: Wow. You talk about blindside, didn’t look like Steckel was looking at him but there’s your description of a blindside. Let’s watch 39.

ANNOUNCER 2: He’s looking for the puck.

ANNOUNCER 1: He’s trying to go up ice, I don’t think that was something that was premeditated, but definitely shoulder on his head. And he’s still doubled over as he makes his way off the ice guys, so. He’s rattled. No question about it.

AMT: So soon afterwards, Sidney Crosby is diagnosed with a concussion. How long was he out of the lineup because of that head injury?

KEN DRYDEN: Well he was he was kind of in and out, and mostly out of the lineup for a long time, for most of, you know, most of the year. And I think he came back for a little bit but then was re-injured and the public really took that hard. I mean, and it was really interesting to see the public reaction to it. I mean, the public had been getting somewhat used to seeing players go down with concussions, with careers ending.

AMT: But this is like one of the greatest players in the world sidelined.

KEN DRYDEN: That's right. And I think it was a secondary thing as well, which was really almost the most critical, is that Sidney Crosby plays the way, you know, that, you know, it is kind of the the dream prototype of the Canadian player. I mean, this is a guy who loves being a part of the action. He goes into the hard places on the ice, he goes into the corners, he goes into the front of the net, he forces his way, he gives contact he gets contact. But it's not, you know, of the exaggerated kind I mean, that you know where he's a big basher and he gets bashed or he's in lots of fights or anything like that. No. He plays the way in our heads we imagine the best of the way in which the game is played. So if that happens to him, that's a big message. And so, you know, I think it it really hit people hard.

AMT: Well and you say the public, but parents of kids who play as well huh?

KEN DRYDEN: Yeah.

AMT: What would they be thinking?

KEN DRYDEN: Well I mean, you know, just imagine if you're a parent at home, and this isn't 50 years ago, where basically, you know, there wasn't much else to do in the wintertime. You know, if you have a son, that son may well be playing hockey. Now it's 50 years later and there are lots of other things to do in the wintertime, and lots of other sports to be engaged in. And you're a parent and you're saying to yourself well, I’d like my kid to have the experience of sports but why not soccer? You know, why not baseball? Why not volleyball? Why not basketball? Great sports. Or even out of sports, you know, why not music? Why not, you know, theatre, why not other things? And so what had never really been quite a choice is a choice. And once you get down to a choice, then the question is like do I want my kid to play? I mean, you know, that this sort of stuff seems to happen and I don't know the consequences of it. And I do know, you know, as a parent even without knowing the science, that having, you know, a wonky knee is not the same thing as having a wonky brain.

AMT: Well, let's talk a little bit about the safety of the game. Between the rules and equipment changes, has professional hockey become less dangerous for players over the years?

KEN DRYDEN: No it hasn't. And that's the, you know, that's the hope of equipment, that's the intention of equipment. But other things change as well as equipment. And so if anybody was to watch full game action of NHL games, even 50 or 60 years ago you would not believe how slow it is. And most people who watched at that time will not believe that because they were ten-years-old, and in their memory all of those great stars were going 100 miles an hour. Well they weren't. And it's not that they weren't great skaters and great players and all the rest of it. But the biggest thing was that hockey was still a game that was emerging out of what had been a no substitution game. At one time in hockey, you had to play the whole game. You know, just as you would in soccer. Well then you were able to make changes, but then players would say well, you know, why would I come off after five minutes? I mean, I used to play for 60. And so by that by the 1950s players were still playing more than two minutes every time they went on the ice. If you're playing for two minutes, you're doing a lot of coasting, you burst if you think you've got a chance, you burst if you think the other team has a chance, but otherwise you're circling and coasting. It's very slow with lots of open space in it, and not that many, you know, moments of contact. Starting in the 1970s and increasingly the game has speeded up as the shifts have gotten shorter. Now they're down to about 35 seconds on the ice. It is like watching the four by 100 metre relay as in the Olympics. You're just passing the baton every 35 seconds. The person who comes over the board, full speed for 35 seconds, pass the baton to the next, full speed full speed full speed through 60 minutes. What happens then of course is that you've got more players going after the puck full speed. There is less space, less time, more collisions and more forceful collisions because they are players moving faster. And that's the nature, the biggest change that has happened really in hockey over these years.

AMT: And so let's link that with some more talk about CTE. I want to talk about the science of CTE and brain concussions. As we were saying, CTE can only now be identified in a brain autopsy. How does that influence the decision makers in hockey about who can play and who can't?

KEN DRYDEN: Well, you know, the first thing that it does of course is that it is its own uncertainty. You know, does a player have CTE? Does a player not have CTE? And from what we know up until now and of brains that have been studied in hockey, it's very likely that a player does not have CTE. You know, that many have but the, you know, the significant majority do not. But we don't know who's who in it. That's the first part of it. The second thing is is that I think what's happened over time, and again, is one of those defenses, that first you deny, then you create doubt, then you do all the rest of it. Well then what's most recent almost is saying OK, CTE is really bad, but that in fact one we don't know whether a player has CTE. And so it's really all about CTE or not. No actually that isn't what it is. There are lots of players who end up and who probably, you know, after they die if they donate their brains and the studies are made, will not have been found to have CTE, but they will been living a number of years of their lives with depression, with anxiety, with, you know, difficulties in terms of making decisions and things like that.

AMT: With other elements of brain injury, in other words.

KEN DRYDEN: That's right. So it's not CTE or nothing. You know, that's one of the things that is so interesting to talk to, you know, neurosurgeons and neuropsychologists, is that the neurosurgeons with their technology, they can't see the evidences of brain damage including CTE. Neuropsychologists can through behaviours. I mean, and it's just as vivid as if you were seeing it through a microscope to see people doing weird things. Well if they're doing weird things chances are there's something going on there. And so it is no defense to say well we can't, we don't know if it's CTE and we can't see it on a screen and therefore somebody is fine. Well if they're not fine, there is something going on. And so it is not a defense.

AMT: In July of last year, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman was interviewed by Sports Illustrated. Now we have that exchange, I want you to listen to it.

SOUNDCLIP

INTERVIEWER: Are there any changes to the rules of the game that you would consider making to eliminate the potential for head injuries?

GARY BETTMAN: Well we've got a long term record on player safety, particularly as it relates to concussions. We were the first sports league to begin to study with our players and the medical community in 1997. We were the first sports league to have protocols for diagnosis and return to play decisions. We've made equipment changes. We created the Department of Player Safety. We've softened the environment with the boards and glass. There have been numerous rule changes. This is an evolving area and it's something that we've been the most proactive than any of other leagues on.

AMT: Ken Dryden, what do you think of Gary Bettman’s response to that question?

KEN DRYDEN: I think that when you're a decision maker, you focus on all the things that you've done and then you step back and you say but what else can I do? Because I see these symptoms. I see these things happening. And so I may set up this committee and that committee and this protocol and that protocol, but if players are going down and if they are experiencing these symptoms then that really isn't quite the answer. I mean, one of the things that was so vivid in doing the book on Steve is reviewing the doctors reports after they had seen him. And so there was a team doctor in Chicago and then there were other specialists that he went to see. I thought when I was going to be reading those reviews, that I would read something that was really sort of haphazard and sloppy. And as I was reading them I was like God they really put him through a lot of tests. I mean, they asked him this and he's above average in this and a little below that but within range, and all of these things. And then I'm doing this chronologically and then I also know what's happened, what Steve is doing and feeling in between times. And eventually start reading these doctors reports and say your reports say he's fine but he's not fine. I mean, he is clearly not fine. And your best, you know, the best science you have available to you, which has generated the most advanced screening that you have, and so it's you're a modern sophisticated scientific person so you rely on that. All of that's great. The problem is he's not fine. And so the tests that you have are not up to the challenge of the whole exercise. And so the key in all of this of course is that if there is something wrong, then that's the indicator as opposed to you know what one is doing.

AMT: So how much power does Gary Bettman have to make brain injuries less common in the NHL?

KEN DRYDEN: Gary Bettman is the the central decision maker in all of hockey. For any of the really big decisions they are either made through the NHL and by Gary Bettman, or they're made with the understanding that this is probably what the NHL would want. And what, you know, what Gary Bettman would want. And he happens to be a capable guy, a smart guy, you know, somebody who now has the authority to do all of these things. I've known Gary Bettman for a long time. I mean, we didn't know each other at Cornell but we both went there and we're both I think a little bit proud of the fact that we both went to Cornell. I was the president of the Toronto Maple Leafs for seven years during the time that Gary has been the commissioner. He is there, he is in position. He's not going anywhere. This isn't something that you can say oh gee I wish there was somebody else in this position and that something would change. He's not going anywhere. He signed a new contract through to 2022. He likes what he's doing, he's good at what he's doing, and that is all the good news because he is smart enough and capable enough, and has the authority enough to do what needs to be done. And the great thing about hockey is that there are answers. That's the part that separates hockey so distinctly from football. Football is a real challenge about what the heck you do with head injuries in football. In hockey there are absolutely answers about what you do. It doesn't take much, it wouldn't take much.

AMT: You say in your book Gary Bettman doesn't need to be a tobacco baron or a climate change denier fighting against the night. What do you mean by that?

KEN DRYDEN: I think that when people don't feel as if they have an answer they run away from the problem. And the great thing in terms of hockey and head injuries is you can run towards it. And we've all been in situations where we've run away. But in this case you can run towards. You know, the situation with Steve Montador and with others, it is not fair, it is not right, and crucially it's not necessary. There are all kinds of things in life that are not fair and not right. But we can't do anything about them, so we get on with life. In this instance it's also not necessary because there are answers. And it begins with a very simple approach and thought, is no hits to the head no excuses. And you go from there.

AMT: Has Gary Bettman read your book?

KEN DRYDEN: I don't know. I mean, we met in New York about I don't know two and a half weeks ago something like that, and I gave him a copy and--

AMT: Did you get him in the elevator and--

KEN DRYDEN: No.

AMT: Point your finger into his chest. No?

KEN DRYDEN: No. We, I mean again, we've known each other for a long time, and we just sort of set it up by email that it was time to have a talk. And so we talked for at lunch for a couple of hours and I left him with the book. And as I said to him, you are the first person who is reading the final version of this book because you are the, you know, the central actor in all of this and you need to know what's there. And as we said to each other, you know, for the next couple of months are going to be a challenge for both of us. But I think we're both up to it. And so I have no idea, you know, whether he said he was going to read it, and he said he was going to read it from beginning to end. And so I don’t know.

AMT: You kind of wrote it for him didn’t you?

KEN DRYDEN: I did. All of this is not about awareness. You know, we confuse awareness with action. All of us who, you know, who don't have power, you know, and whether it's the scientist or whether it's those in the media. You know, we think we have power but we don't. Somebody else is making the decision. And we assume that if we generate awareness than those that do have the power will take that awareness and make informed decisions, and then we look around and well that doesn't really happen. So then what do we think the answer is? More awareness. So it's more articles, more studies, more or you know this and that and the other. We build the mountain of awareness so high, so unmissable, so outrageous, so humiliating, that of course something has to be done, doesn't really happen. That unless, you know, you feel as if there's a way you distract yourself to other things. I mean, one of the things I say in the book and it was to me the phrase, you know, that I love and that I've used a million times of where there's a will there's a way and all that's great, and we know it's true and we know we need it to be true. That in big tough questions it's really the reverse. It's where there's a way there's a will. And if you can't give me a way, I'm sorry but I can't generate for you the will that is necessary in order for things to be different.

AMT: So you touched on it, but what kind of changes do you think should be implemented to bring down the number of concussions?

KEN DRYDEN: You start with no hits to the head period and no excuses. The NHL has at least two mandatory rules that are interesting examples for this. One of them is that when a player is in their own defensive zone and they shoot the puck over the boards it's a penalty, automatic. When that rule was first introduced it was like this is crazy, he didn't intend to, the puck flipped, the ice is lousy, the glass is at different levels in different arenas. I mean, all of these things. Well, you know, that was a few months worth. Now it is just instinctive automatic, the player goes to the box no arguments, the game goes on. The teams get over it.

AMT: So this can happen.

KEN DRYDEN: The second one, and this is the critical one, is that in terms of a hit to the face. Now a stick to somebody else's face, an opponent's face, automatic a penalty. If the person is cut, you know, usually sort of a double minor and it could be worse than that, automatic. Same thing initially you can't do that, he didn't intend to this, it bounced off the opponent's arm his stick or something like that. No. Sorry. The important thing was the hit to the face, not the explanation of how it happened. Well you can do exactly the same thing in terms of head injuries. Whether they are accidental or intentional, whether they are incidental or significant, whether they are from an elbow or a fist or something else. It doesn't matter. The brain doesn't distinguish. That's the point is that the brain doesn't say oh well it's OK because you didn't intend to or because it was really with an elbow, you know, rather than something else. No, it's about the injury, it's about the brain, it's about the player being hit. It's about the effect, you know, of it not the cause.

AMT: Ken Dryden, we have to leave it there. Thank you.

KEN DRYDEN: Thanks Anna Maria.

CW: Ken Dryden's book is, "Game Change: The Life and Death of Steve Montador and the Future of Hockey." Anna Maria Tremonti spoke with him in October. Ken Dryden continues to call on Gary Bettman and the NHL to do more. At a concussion symposium in London, Ontario, earlier this month, Ken Dryden was joined by another NHL great, Eric Lindros. The former NHL forward called on the NHL to consider banning body contact altogether. That's our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q. Former Saturday Night Live cast member, Sasheer Zamata is on the show. Finally, tributes continue to pour in today for Republican Senator John McCain, who died on Saturday at age 81. The former Vietnam prisoner of war and Republican U.S. presidential candidate, was known as a political maverick who always spoke his mind, including during this 2014 interview with CBC Radio's The House, when asked what he'd say to President Vladimir Putin about Russia's intervention in Ukraine. We'll give John McCain the last word today. I'm Connie Walker. Thanks for listening to the summer edition of The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: Vladimir Putin? He's already sanctioned me. Vladimir Putin has sanctioned me and he knows who I am and what I'm about and he thinks that I'm one of the worst people in the world. And I am proud of that that, that he sanctioned me.

VOICE 2: Senator McCain it's a real pleasure to have you on the program.

VOICE 1: Always. Thank you.

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Aug. 27, 2018 episode transcript

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