Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2021

EVIL BY DESIGN

EPISODE 6: “Peter Says, Hi”.

Timothy Sawa: The following episode contains difficult subject matter and references to sexual assault. Please take care.

It’s 10 o’clock at night in March of 2009, and I’m working late in my home office in Winnipeg. At this point, we are only a few months into our research on the Peter Nygard story. As I turn out the lights, I notice something strange. A car is sitting outside in front of my house, its headlights reflecting off the snowbanks that have piled up on my street from a long prairie winter. It’s idling, and a man is just sitting in the front seat. While I wait, I tap out an email to a colleague. “Not to sound too paranoid,” I write, “but there's been a vehicle outside my house with someone in it for at least half an hour-- and perhaps longer.”

Adding to my paranoia, I was supposed to meet with two Nygard whistleblowers that same evening, but had to reschedule. The next day, I see the same dirty grey sedan outside my house-- this time I take photos...from a distance.

On the third day, it’s there again.

I’ve had enough. I walk up the car and knock on the window. The driver confirms he is a private investigator “working in the area”. But he quickly assures me he isn’t watching my house. That’s funny, since I don’t tell him which house is mine.

I don’t see him again after that.

But it was just the beginning of a series of bizarre happenings-- and a taste of the kind of fight Peter Nygard would put up against the CBC. Surveillance, threats, private investigators, and lawsuits.

In the end, because of our reporting, my colleagues and I would find ourselves facing criminal charges...and a potential five years in prison.

Soundclip: [Opening theme music]

Timothy Sawa: I’m Timothy Sawa, and this is Evil by Design Episode Six: “Peter Says, Hi”.

Soundclip: [Music ends]

Timothy Sawa: This is the story of how my colleagues and I at the CBC came to investigate Peter Nygard, and the roadblocks we faced along the way. I'm telling you this because it fits a pattern of how Nygard deals with the journalists who investigate him. And it helps us answer the question, "Why did it take so long for the allegations about him to come to light?"

Like many big stories, this one started with a tip.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] All right, so when I emailed you and said, "Are you up for another interview?" What went through your mind?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Why not? It’s something I'm able to talk about probably more openly than ever.

Timothy Sawa: That tip came from long time Winnipegger and former Nygard HR manager, Dana Neal, more than a decade ago.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] I didn't have a choice. I mean, what was I gonna do? Just turn a blind eye, and carry on, and just let these things happen? Let him abuse and victimize people, and... I started having kind of an existential dilemma.

As somebody who recruits people and gets them into jobs, you know, I had sort of a code of ethics where in that, I don't want to just hire somebody just to check a box or anything like that. People will spend more time, sometimes, with their colleagues than they will with their families.

And so, I've always endeavoured to make people's lives better in that recruiting transaction. And it didn't feel like that anymore. I felt like I was actually hurting people.

Timothy Sawa: Dana was hired at Nygard in 2006. He spent the next two years working in the HR department. It didn’t take long before he realized there was a problem.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] I think it was the turnover that happened with some of the travel coordinators. They would just leave the office one day and then just not come back. Just completely drop off the face of the earth. Then I started hearing stories about his management style.

When things really started to get revealed was when I started traveling to the world headquarters in New York, and then that's when I experienced firsthand the screaming, the yelling, the verbal abuse. Then that's when I really started to think, "Okay, what am I doing here?"

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] What about on the sexual harassment side of things, or just sexually inappropriate behaviour? Was there stuff in that category?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Sure, I mean, there's the incident that I witnessed that I talked about in the original doc about the woman whose breasts he exposed, you know, to me, and put his hand down her pants into her crotch.

Timothy Sawa: Dana told us that Nygard said he’d been taking care of this woman since she was 17-years-old.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] There was a woman in particular, who I won't name, who worked in marketing and events. And she literally quit because she was gonna be sent back to the Bahamas, and she just couldn't do it because he just stalked her, and just did all kinds of things to her.

So there's there's-- yeah, there's a lot there, Timothy. I could go on.

Timothy Sawa: But well before any of this could make it to air in 2010, Peter Nygard would launch his first legal assault. Post Me-Too, many of you will be familiar with NDAs, or non-disclosure agreements. They’re gagging clauses in employment contracts, exit documents, or settlement agreements. NDAs were a key tool used by Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, and former Fox News chairman, Roger Ailes, to shield their predatory and illegal behaviour from the public.

When he started working for Nygard, Dana Neal signed the same kind of confidentiality agreement. So years later, when we were first investigating Nygard, his lawyers threatened in a suit: if Dana talked, he and the CBC would pay.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] I knew it would be a ride. I knew he loved to sue, and he loved to litigate, and we were talking. Sounded like you guys were prepared for that, too. I just felt I didn't have a choice, like I had to do it.

And confidentiality was irrelevant because when people are being put in harm's way, and when harm is being done, I mean, there's not a confidentiality agreement in the world that should be applicable in those situations.

Timothy Sawa: That lawsuit would be our first legal battle with Peter Nygard, his first overt attempt to shut us down...but it wouldn’t be the last.

Soundclip: [Music]

Soundclip: [Electric whirring]

Timothy Sawa: It’s a sunny afternoon in June, and my family van is being lifted up on a hoist in a commercial garage in Winnipeg. Two men begin searching the undercarriage...for a GPS tracking device.

Soundclip: [Electric whirring]

Timothy Sawa: Again, this might sound paranoid, but a strange pattern had emerged in our investigation. As I contacted or met with sources, usually former Nygard employees, shortly after, we would receive emails supposedly from them, recanting much of what they’d told us about Nygard, and instead praising their former boss and his business acumen.

These emails all had the same style, and we suspected they had been written by the same person.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: Then the original whistleblowers, Dana Neal, and his colleague in HR at Nygard, Pat Prouse, experienced something strange.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Things got really weird.

Middle of the night, somebody is trying to smash their way in through the front door. And their shoulder is hitting the doorbell. Incidentally, they broke it, and I still haven't fixed it.

And so I went out the patio door in the backyard, and I had a bat, and I went around the side of the house, and then I just pointed it at him, and then just gestured for him like, get lost. And then he asked me, "Do you know Peter Nygard?"

And then I was just dumbfounded, I was just struck. And then he just jumped off the steps and ran away. And that happened after Pat got jumped. When he was going home from having some drinks with some friends and, yeah, he got jumped, and before they ran away, one of them said to him, "Peter says, hi."

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: On more than one occasion, I had to remind myself of that expression, “Just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they aren’t after you”. Nygard’s people always seemed to know what we were going to do, before we did it. While we didn’t find anything on my vehicle, one day I got a clue that might explain some of the coincidences.

I was having a phone meeting with colleagues about the Nygard story, when I was put on hold. After about five minutes, a computerized voice came on and asked if I wanted to keep recording the call. The strange part, neither I nor anyone else on the call was recording. Was someone tapping my cell phone?

I’ll never know for sure, but I’ll also never forget that ominous voice saying someone was listening in.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: The next phase of our investigation involved going to the Bahamas. The CBC didn’t want me travelling there without support. So we found someone with deep connections on the island to help.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] Well, I was an FBI agent for 30 years. I always told people they could write a book about me. A lot of exciting cases. Worked undercover for two, three years. Caught a lot of fugitives. Was in one shootout, got shot.

Timothy Sawa: Jerry Forrester is retired from the FBI now, and working as a private investigator, specializing in the Caribbean. He’s tall, with bright white hair, and a Magnum PI moustache to match.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] So I worked the Bahamas, I worked Bermuda. Turks and Caicos.I worked Cayman Islands. So I was continually travelling, and I had a caseload of probably 100-150 cases a month.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Wow.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] A little difficult.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] I can imagine you were busy, but also, I can also imagine that's a pretty great job to have with the FBI.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] It was the best job in the FBI. If it wasn't mandatory, I'd still be there.

Timothy Sawa: He was already well-acquainted with Peter Nygard before we hired him in 2010.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] I met him when he wanted to see me. I went down to his house...after I retired. And I, of course, I knew a little bit about him, so I brought my assistant with me as a witness if anything did occur.

I'm not saying anything would have occurred.

So we had a nice dinner and talked a little bit, and he wanted to hire me. And I said, "No, I can't do that, I already have a job."

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] What did he want to hire you for?

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] I guess as head of the security. I guess, I don't know. I didn't even entertain him, wasn't even on my mind. He could have paid me a million dollars a year, I wouldn't have taken it.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Why is that?

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] His reputation.

Timothy Sawa: Jerry met me at the airport in the Bahamas. Over the next several days, we scoured the main island, meeting and talking to as many people as we could.

Eventually, my reporting colleague, Bob McKeown joined me.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] It was the most tempestuous story I've ever done.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] That's saying something. I know you've worked on a few stories.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] Yeah, and it's-- I was thinking also about this. Is it the one that's lasted longest, because it started in the middle of 2009, and here we are in the middle of 2020.

Timothy Sawa: Bob has travelled the world as a journalist with the CBC, then as a correspondent for CBS News where he covered the first Gulf War, and eventually as a host for NBC’s Dateline. In 2002 he came back home to Canada to return as co-host for the CBC’s investigative TV show, The Fifth Estate.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] The story of Peter Nygard has been the most intense story I've been involved with, and unusually more and more intense and pressurized as it's gone along. So I think the past year has been...we've been under more pressure on this story than any other time in its gestation.

Timothy Sawa: And as we continued to dig, one name in particular kept coming up: Maribel.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] She had been one of the, quote, packages, unquote, invited to Nygard Cay, his house in the Bahamas, for what he called "pamper parties". And she had been controversial because we were told by a number of people that at some point when she was there, she had an episode of some sort.

She was emotional. She was frightened. She was looking for people to help her. She wanted to go home, which was in the Dominican Republic. There was some debate about whether she was 16 or 17. At that point, we wanted to try to find her.

This was several years later, because she was an example of what people said happened, that young girls got lured to Peter Nygard's estate, and some of them may have been sexually abused.

Timothy Sawa: We tried for months to find Maribel. But the Dominican Republic had a population of almost ten million people, and even her full name was just too common. We finally reached out to Peter Nygard’s lawyers and asked about her. That’s when something strange happened...I got an alert.

A few days after we sent that letter, we found out that Peter Nygard’s private plane had taken off, and it was headed to, where else? The Dominican Republic.

We knew this because when someone owns a private airplane registered with the FAA, they have to file a flight plan every time they travel. And if you know where to look, those flight plans are public. We were going to need someone on the ground quickly, and I knew just who to call.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] You called me, and then you asked me if I could get somebody to get to that plane and do a little surveillance on who's on it and what is occurring. If I remember right, the plane landed, my investigators were there, the plane sat there for quite a while with a lady standing at the door. And finally, I believe she left, and was followed by my people, and went to a bar or a restaurant.

And my people observed them talking and discussing things. And it was that girl. And the girl that was on the plane, I don't know who she was. She had a sheet of paper, a bunch of paper that the girl read. And I think she handed her a pen and she signed it. And that's when they left.

Timothy Sawa: So a woman, flying in Nygard's private plane, travels to the Dominican Republic. She meets with another young woman who Jerry's investigators identify as Maribel, the same woman I’d been searching for months, and hands her some papers to sign.

Not long after that, we received a sworn affidavit from Nygard’s lawyers signed by Maribel.In it, Maribel describes her first visit to Nygard Cay as "pleasant and fun."

"Nygard," she says, "was a perfect gentleman."

At this point, we were only a day away from airing our story when I got a voicemail from Nygard’s lawyer.

Soundclip: [Voicemail] It’s Jay Prober calling. I hope you are having a good evening. It’s Thursday, April 8th, at about five to nine. I’m calling about Nygard. I’m now representing him, with respect to one aspect of allegation #1.

Timothy Sawa: Allegation number one was what we named Maribel’s story in our letter to Peter Nygard.

Soundclip: [Voicemail] And that’s the issue of potential prosecution for defamatory libel under the criminal code. We have evidence apparently that the girl in question says that there was nothing improper about Nygard’s behaviour. Apparently, CBC didn’t interview this woman.

So, I don’t know if you are going with that aspect of the story tomorrow night or not, but I can tell you that I’m putting your clients on notice that Sawa and any others may be liable for prosecution for defamatory libel, either at the instance of the Attorney General or privately.

Thanks, take care. Bye bye.

Timothy Sawa: Defamatory libel under the criminal code? I did some late-night research. Criminal libel is a rare but real charge in Canada. Usually, if someone feels they’ve been defamed in the media, they launch a civil suit.

But there is an option for them to pursue criminal charges, if they believe another person has published defamatory information, knowing it to be false. The kicker-- a charge like this can be made privately, without police involvement.

In other words, someone with money to burn, like Peter Nygard, can hire a lawyer and file the charge themselves. And we’d be forced to defend ourselves in criminal court. It carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

Here was our dilemma. On one hand, we had a signed statement from Maribel saying nothing had happened to her at Nygard Cay. On the other, we had three sources who said something did.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] I remember, we were just on the verge of going to air in April 2010. And I think at that point, we'd been sued already, multiple times. I remember you and I looking at each other and saying, "We'd better talk this over somewhere else," just to get our heads clear.

And we went to that pub, and we sat down, and the question was, it's still not too late. We can still get out of this if for any reason we think that that's the wise course.

It didn't take long, frankly, to decide it wasn't the right course, that we had come too far, that legally, journalistically, ethically, we were on firm ground. And we went back and committed ourselves to it.

I remember, we had one last drink and we toasted to our good fortune, and said that we hoped we wouldn't be there three years later in the middle of a legal morass and still involved with the Nygard story.

Well, it's not three years, Tim. It's 11.

Timothy Sawa: We went ahead with the story about Maribel, including an interview with two former employees describing what they witnessed.

Soundclip: [Employee 1] She just panicked and just started screaming and crying, and she ran out and she actually ended up finding us, right?

Soundclip: [Employee 2] And she sat right next to me, and she just-- tears were rolling down her eyes, and I put my arm around her and said, "What’s wrong?"

And she says, "I have to get out of here."

And I came and talked to you, I think, and only place I knew-- I knew a place where to hide her where nobody would look.

Timothy Sawa: And Peter Nygard followed through with his threat.

Soundclip: [Bob McKeown] Months later, we received summonses and-- and legal documents from the Attorney General of Manitoba informing us that we were being criminally charged under the Criminal Code of Canada.

Timothy Sawa: Bob McKeown, and another Fifth Estate producer, Morris Karp, and I were all facing charges. But we weren’t the only ones paying a personal price for taking on Peter Nygard. After our story came out, he sued whistleblowers Patrick Prouse and Dana Neal again in civil court. They would spend tens of thousands defending themselves.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] So looking back at all of this, 12 years since you did this, was it worth it?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Yeah, I mean, it just feels like the clock is ticking.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] And what about the price you paid?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] I didn't have a choice. What else could I do? Ignore it? Walk away from it?

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Others have.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Oh, yeah. Oh, absolutely. Or they dip their toe in the water and then it was way too cold or too hot, and backed off. But, yeah, I was just...I didn't have a choice. And I'm glad you guys have pursued it.

I have a question for you. If there hadn’t been like this just crazy amount of lawsuits, litigation, and everything, would you guys have continued to investigate this like you have?

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] It's hard to know, I guess, isn't it? I mean, they do become a motivating factor at a certain point, don't they?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Yeah.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] I mean...

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Oh, yeah.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] If there was nothing there, why fight back so hard?

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Because I think you told me that you guys had never seen anything like this before, dealt with anything like this before.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Not before or since.

Soundclip: [Dana Neal] Not before or since, well, that's good to hear.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Yeah. It's the only time I've been criminally charged for doing my job.

Timothy Sawa: Before we go any further, I want to take a moment to point out something important. Nothing that I, nor any other journalist went through in covering Peter Nygard, will ever compare to the violence and trauma experienced by the women and girls he is accused of raping. The strength and bravery they showed in coming forward to expose him is unmatched.

But in answering the question, "Why did it take so long for the truth to come out?" it is important to look at how far Nygard went to stop the journalists who tried to investigate him. In our situation, we knew the statement by Maribel would be used against us in the criminal case.

But it wasn’t until later that we realized Peter Nygard’s charges against us would involve a second element. A three month-long undercover investigation...into us.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: Nygard’s use of the courts to protect his reputation is legendary. He’s sued or used the courts to threaten the Winnipeg Free Press, a Finnish newspaper, Toronto Life Magazine, The New York Times, and several former employees who have tried to go public over the years.

And then there are the five legal actions he’s filed against the CBC and our sources, including the criminal charges. By 2011, Peter Nygard’s legal assault against the CBC was in high gear.

That’s when a private investigator working for Nygard, Alick Morrison, filed an affidavit saying he has “recordings” that show the CBCs “criminal behaviour.” And they needed to be brought to the attention of the FBI. It was the first clear indication we had been infiltrated.

Soundclip: [Music]

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison recording] It’s almost five to six now, and it’s July the 6th. I’m in the Loews hotel, I’ve just met with...

Timothy Sawa: The audio is hard to make out, but this is Alick Morrison recording himself as he’s coming out of a meeting. He was asking for dirt on Peter Nygard.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison recording] ..put something fairly concrete in front of them. Not general...

Timothy Sawa: He said his objective was to put something concrete in front of his client. His client is supposedly a fashion company in Europe, a Nygard competitor that wants to take Nygard down.

But in reality, Alick Morrison is a former Scotland Yard detective working for Peter Nygard. He has brokered this fake meeting with the CBC’s private investigator. His actual goal, dig up dirt on the CBC.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison] When CBC got involved, did they hire you, Jerry, or did you go and hire them?

Timothy Sawa: And for some reason, he keeps asking about a connection between the CBC, and Nygard’s neighbour and nemesis, billionaire Louis Bacon.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison] Given that we were asking the question, was whether Louie Bacon kind of assisted with the CBC program.

Timothy Sawa: Jerry Forrester, our PI, has no idea these conversations are being recorded.

Or that the person they're really after, is me.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison] What's Tim's name? Tim what?

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] Tim Sawa.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison] Sawa.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] S, A, W, A.

Soundclip: [Alick Morrison] And he's from CBC, is he?

Timothy Sawa: Last year, I told Jerry the true purpose of these meetings.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] You know what evidence they used to charge me and other people at the CBC with a criminal charge? They used Alick Morrison's investigation.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] Are you kidding me?

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] So from our understanding, they went to you to get to us.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] You think?

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] I know.

Timothy Sawa: At this point, I'd already been approached by a number of different people, claiming they were looking into Peter Nygard. It turned out they were also working for him.

We would later learn, this undercover ruse lasted three months and involved interviews with dozens of sources, and trips to New York, the Bahamas, and eventually another meeting between Forrester and that fake fashion company in London.

Soundclip: [Jerry Forrester] We're meeting with this fashion company. We don't know the name of it yet. And Bradley and I fly to London. He had somebody meet us at the airport, and on the guy's-- what do you call it? The front seat-- the console on the front seat, there was the name of the company written on it.

It was like I was set-up. He has me sit in the front seat. He has the name of his company there that he's picking us up for. We're working for Jennifer Fashions. And there is a Jennifer Fashions. So we meet in an office building somewhere in London.

Timothy Sawa: Late into the meeting, the so-called fashion executives finally ask our private investigators their big question. They want to know if Louis Bacon, Nygard’s former neighbour, “funded” our story. Of course the answer is no, which is what Jerry tells them.

If the goal of the undercover investigation was to connect the CBC to Louis Bacon, and show some kind of conspiracy, then it was a bust. Instead, Nygard’s own fake investigation resulted in several people, on tape, talking about rumours of Nygard’s abuse of others.

Soundclip: [Mary Braithwaite recording] We’re still trying to identify the individual...

Timothy Sawa: This is Mary Braithwaite. She’s the GM of the Lyford Cay Property Owners Association in the Bahamas.

Soundclip: [Mary Braithwaite recording] You know how these stories go, but unlike consensual situations, it was a situation where the girl was handcuffed, held against her will, and forced to do horrible things that traumatized her so much, she had a breakdown.

Timothy Sawa: Those undercover tapes could have been damaging to Nygard, and his lawyer successfully argued for a publication ban in court, keeping the tapes from the public. But recently, they were released. And that's why we can finally tell this story. Despite the undercover investigation finding no evidence we did anything wrong, the Canadian criminal case against us chugged on.

That’s because Nygard still had the second pillar of his case, his key witness. That young woman from the Dominican Republic...Maribel. She had sworn an affidavit that effectively said the CBC got it wrong. Peter Nygard had done nothing to hurt her.

She was scheduled to testify against us in 2019. But before that could happen, I met a Nygard insider who helped me see her story in a whole new light.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: In 2014, big news broke that one of Peter Nygard’s personal videographers had switched sides. After working for Nygard for nearly three years, this employee approached Louis Bacon. In exchange for a promise to back him up if he were sued, and payment for living expenses, he was willing to turn over all of his video footage and become a witness against Nygard.

Last year, I finally got a chance to meet him.

Soundclip: [Music playing]

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] So this video is Nygard flying on his airplane, and one of the girlfriends is dancing on the stripper pole.

Timothy Sawa: His name is Stephen Feralio. He agreed to talk to me and show me his footage.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] When I first was hired, Nygard told me that the reason why Jesus is so popular is because he had a good PR team. He was well documented. So he wanted everything filmed.

And then later we would piece it together and edit it however we saw fit, but my job was to film literally everything. 99% of my travels was, I was filming.

Timothy Sawa: Stephen said he wanted to make something clear. As far as he knows, he never witnessed or filmed anything illegal. We spent hours and hours together, looking at the video he shot. He showed me footage of Nygard screaming at his employees.

Soundclip: [Peter Nygard] It’s so disgusting, your fucking behaviours. It’s the worst fucking place I visit. Only place I can be pissed off like this at. It's just sheer fucking neglect. Sheer fucking rudeness.

Timothy Sawa: Trying to get the phone number of a 16-year-old athlete at the Olympics in London.

Soundclip: [Peter Nygard] Just to be here at the Olympics and to be running, good for you, that's just...

Soundclip: [Woman] Yeah, that's amazing.

Soundclip: [Peter Nygard] And at 16, yet. So you got another Olympics to come in Brazil, yeah. Get her cell number or something, yeah.

Timothy Sawa: And bragging about how he helped get politicians elected in the Bahamas.

Soundclip: [Peter Nygard] Isn’t it wonderful? We won, we won, we won! Thanks to everybody, you know? The one of the best nights of my life, yeah. I never thought I would get so involved with politics of all things. Let alone be the key instrument in making it happen, for Christ's sake. Wow!

Timothy Sawa: Then, as we scrolled through his footage together, out of the blue, Stephen mentioned a familiar name.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] All right, this is Maribel Rodriguez on Nygard's plane.

Timothy Sawa: That’s right, the same woman who is the key witness against us in the criminal case launched by Nygard.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] So I first met Maribel on a trip to Dominican Republic, to Punta Cana, with Nygard. It was clear that Nygard previously knew her. She was very familiar with him, and then she started kind of working with us from that trip on.

Timothy Sawa: Stephen’s videos proved, after our original documentary, Nygard gave Maribel a job. There are videos of her travelling in China with Nygard, and touring the Great Wall.

Soundclip: [Music]

Soundclip: [Maribel Rodriguez] Thank you, Peter, the opportunity.

Timothy Sawa: Maribel playing poker with Nygard in Winnipeg.

Soundclip: [Peter Nygard] He's been-- it's a nice bet.

Timothy Sawa: Partying with Nygard at a nightclub in the Bahamas.

Soundclip: [Man] ..dos, tres, cuatro!

Soundclip: [Club music playing]

Timothy Sawa: Even celebrating Christmas with Nygard and his family, and making a speech.

Soundclip: [Maribel Rodriguez] Merry Christmas, and thank you everybody. And thank Peter to be here...

Timothy Sawa: While the videos appear to show Maribel having a good time, Stephen said when the camera wasn’t rolling, the reality could be much different.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] So she translated and helped us in Dominican Republic. She kind of just took us around, and from then on, she became kind of like a personal assistant. I know on one occasion she was cutting Nygard's fingernails, and brushing his teeth, and showering him, and also packing his pills, and organizing him when he would go to a hotel. She would unpack him, and she became kind of like a personal assistant.

So we were staying at a hotel in China, and I heard screaming from down the hall, and it was Maribel and Nygard. And I walked over and I listened, and he was just screaming at her, and she was on the floor, and she was crying, and she was like flailing her arms. And she was just very, very distraught.

Timothy Sawa: Then Stephen dropped a bomb. He tells me about a video he filmed with Maribel that appears to have direct ties with Nygard’s criminal case against the CBC.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] At some point, when I was working for Nygard, Tiina Tulikorpi, an executive with the Nygard companies, approached me and asked me to film something. And so I went down and I set up for an interview with Maribel.

Timothy Sawa: We wish we could let you hear it, but Stephen says he was told to destroy the footage after he filmed it.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] I still have the invoice and a picture from the setup. She had a statement up off to the side of the camera. And Tiina was there coaching her.

And I had to cut the camera multiple times. Maribel was crying and we would stop. And then I would help her pronounce words. She didn't know what some of these words are.

It was very obvious that this statement was written for her, and she was reading it sort of against her will. And so after that, I edited that video, I sent it in, and then I was paid very promptly.

Timothy Sawa: Stephen’s recollection of that video taped statement is a near identical match to Maribel’s sworn affidavit, sent to the CBC.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] I remember her saying, "Peter Nygard was nothing but a gentleman to me. I never met the Mays."

Timothy Sawa: The Mays are the two former Nygard employees we interviewed, who said she was screaming, and crying, and looking for help one night.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] So when Tiina would leave, or get an email or something, Maribel and I would look at each other and she would give me this look like...her heart rate, I'm sure, was elevated. Her breaths were erratic. She was sobbing. This was not a pleasant experience for Maribel.

And then the fact that I was then asked to-- this was the only time I've ever been asked by the Nygard companies to erase footage.

I think Tiina just said, you know, this is just like a secret project where you got to just do it. So on a number of occasions while filming her, I had to cut the camera, and we calmed Maribel down, and then we recorded.

So I cut out all the parts where Maribel was distraught, and I edited together a nice statement. I gave it to Tiina and deleted it on my end.

Timothy Sawa: I reached Tiina on the phone late last year.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] So we spoke to one of Peter Nygard's videographers who talks about the day that you asked him to set up for an interview. And then Maribel came down for the interview and that she was crying, that you were coaching her, and that she was making a statement against her will.

That's what he observed.

Soundclip: [Tiina Tulikorpi] Oh, no. Oh, my goodness, no. Maribel Rodriguez would never have done any kind of a statement against her will. I mean, that's not, uh, that's not true.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] So do you recall a statement being taken from Maribel on video?

Soundclip: [Tiina Tulikorpi] I recall Maribel give a statement of her own, and I recall helping with her accent because she had to-- she speaks, uh, at that time anyway, she had a heavy Spanish accent. And she was trying hard to pronounce the things that she wanted to say in English. But that's-- that's, I mean, she would never have made a fake anything.

Soundclip: [Timothy Sawa] Hmm.

Timothy Sawa: We had more questions for Tiina, but later, she said she wouldn't talk to us anymore because of, quote, "All of the legal cases.”

I asked Stephen Feralio if Maribel had ever said anything about Nygard’s fight with the CBC.

Soundclip: [Stephen Feralio] Not directly about this. I do have something that I could share. Maribel had a son back in Dominican Republic, and her mother that she was supporting financially.

So I know that she would take her paycheques and send them directly to her mother and her son. So I remember her saying, like, "This job is crazy. This is crazy, but I have to do it. I have to support my family."

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: It was a sad revelation. We contacted Maribel recently. But she let us know, through her lawyer, that she wasn’t going to speak to us at this time.

Over the last decade, we saw, up close, the extreme lengths that Peter Nygard was willing to go to, to stop our reporting. I’d been surveilled, sued, and criminally prosecuted. It’s no wonder that other journalists before us had tried, but were defeated. Without the CBC behind us, our story almost certainly would have died before it went to air.

And we wouldn't be doing this podcast today.

Nygard repeatedly used the courts and his political and economic influence to silence anyone who tried to expose him. Until last year, when dozens of women came forward, so many were kept in the dark. Even members of Nygard's family say they had no idea.

But now, some of them are speaking out against him. And bringing forward accusations of their own.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: Coming up on Evil By Design…

Soundclip: [Kai Nygard] I'm looking at his eyes 'cause I was thinking to myself, who is this guy? Did I just see what I really thought I saw?

Soundclip: [Shannon Moroney] Your father is going to go down in history as one of the worst sexual predators there ever was. It is a living hell.

Soundclip: [Kai Nygard] This is what I saw with my own eyes. This isn't he said she said, this is what my brothers told me.

Soundclip: [Music]

Timothy Sawa: If anything you’ve heard in this episode has left you looking for someone to talk to, please visit cbc.ca/uncover. We have a number of resources there for those in need of help and support.

Evil By Design is a co-production between CBC Podcasts and the Fifth Estate. You can find the Fifth Estate’s latest documentary, Peter Nygard: the Secret Videos on Youtube.

This podcast is written by Producer, Ashley Mak, Associate Producer, Ilina Ghosh, and me, Timothy Sawa. With assistance from Lynette Fortune at the Fifth Estate. Mixing and sound design by Evan Kelly. With technical assistance from Laura Antonelli. For this episode, special thanks goes to Danny Henry, Sally Reardon, and David Studer. Emilie Quesnel is our digital producer. Fact-checking by Emily Mathieu, and legal advice from Sean Moreman. Original Music by Olivia Pasquarelli. Our Senior Producer at CBC Podcasts is Chris Oke. And our Executive Producer is Arif Noorani.

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

Transcript: Evil By Design Episode 6

More Stories Like This