Woman tells Frank Stronach trial she became ‘social recluse’ after 1986 incident

TORONTO — Trauma and fear turned a woman into a “social recluse” after she was sexually assaulted by billionaire businessman Frank Stronach four decades ago, she told a Toronto court Wednesday.

In testimony punctuated by tears, the woman described living in fear and losing her “zest for life” after she said Stronach forced himself on her the night of Valentine’s Day 1986.

“I was afraid to open up to people because of what happened to me,” she said, her voice unsteady.

“It was something like I could not shake it off because it caused me a great deal of trauma, emotional stress.”

The 73-year-old woman is the sixth of seven complainants expected to testify at the trial, which began two weeks ago after some delay.

Stronach, the founder of the auto parts conglomerate Magna International, has pleaded not guilty to 12 charges related to alleged incidents spanning from the 1970s to the 1990s.

On Wednesday, prosecutors withdrew one count of forcible confinement related to the complainant on the stand.

At the urging of prosecutors and the presiding judge, the woman took several breaks to calm herself Wednesday as she laid out her account of what happened that night.

After working a late shift, the woman said she headed out to Rooney’s, the midtown hot spot Stronach owned, because she didn’t want to be at home alone in her west-end apartment.

To her surprise, there was hardly anyone there when she arrived, she said, so she decided to have one drink at the bar before going home. As she drank a glass of wine, a group of well-dressed, good-looking men came up to the bar and sat on the stools, she said.

A middle-aged man sat next to her and started a conversation, she said. The woman said she wasn’t particularly interested in talking to him until he asked if she was hungry and ordered a large bowl of shrimp from the bar.

She hadn’t eaten dinner, she said, so she accepted the food. She and the man had a “casual conversation,” mostly about skiing, and at some point he introduced himself as Frank. She didn’t know it was Stronach at the time, she said.

He seemed “very nice, very caring,” and didn’t raise any red flags, she said. He told her he was divorced and worked as a machine operator, she said.

She noticed the other men in the group had disappeared, leaving her alone with Stronach, she said.

When the woman mentioned having to leave before the last subway, Stronach told her not to worry, to have another drink and he would drive her home, she said. She had another glass or two of wine, she said, but Stronach wasn’t drinking.

They danced at some point and moved to a table, then a young man came over and asked Stronach if he wanted him to drive, she said. Stronach said no and told the other man to just bring the car.

As they left at around 2 or 2:30 a.m., the young man brought a cherry red Chevrolet to the front of the venue, then got out so that Stronach could get in the driver’s seat, she said. The woman got in the passenger seat and gave him directions to her home, she said.

Instead, he pulled into an underground parking garage in the harbourfront, telling her he lived in the building and needed to have a coffee before driving her the rest of the way, she said.

The woman said she didn’t want to go, but followed him because she didn’t know where she was. They took the elevator to an elegant apartment on a high floor, she said.

It was a two-level apartment, and they initially sat on a couch on the higher level, she said. She recalled seeing large windows and a mirrored ceiling.

At some point, the woman said she went to the kitchen, but there was no coffee or food there, just a fridge “full of booze.”

She lost track of Stronach for a bit, and the next time she saw him, he was naked on a waterbed on the lower level of the apartment, she said.

Stronach told her he wanted to see her naked and tugged her toward him by the hands or wrists, she said.

Shocked and angry, the woman tried not to look at him as she broke free, she said. “I just shouted, ‘Take me home, take me home, take me home,'” she said.

Stronach relented when she threatened to break all the windows and jump into Lake Ontario, she said. He put on his pants but didn’t zip up the fly, she said. He may also have put on a shirt but left it open, she added.

He got a bottle of Dubonnet and two glasses, urging her to have a glass to calm down, but the woman refused, she said.

As they sat on the couch, Stronach tried to convince her it had been a nice evening and that he would take her home, she said.

He then pushed her so she was leaning back into the corner of the couch, unzipped her pants and pulled them down almost to her knees, she said. The woman tried to wriggle free, she said, but felt “overpowered.”

Stronach then forced his penis inside her, she said. He didn’t use protection and ejaculated partly inside of her, she said.

It was over quickly, lasting less than five minutes, she said. Afterward, she was shaking and crying as she zipped up her pants, she said.

The woman said she felt dirty and angry at the betrayal.

“He betrayed my trust not just towards him but towards everyone I met after him,” she said, sobbing.

“That’s why I’m alone, because I could never trust another man for the rest of my life or get close to anybody.”

Stronach again disappeared for some moments, and when he returned, told the woman he would take her home, she said.

This time, she sat in the back seat, wanting to be as far away from him as possible, she said.

Before parking near her home, Stronach offered to get her a job at Rooney’s, saying he was the owner, she said.

The woman was so angry that she slammed the door on her way out and broke one of her high heels, she said. She told Stronach to take the job and “shove it,” she said, adding she hoped he still remembered that moment.

She wasn’t working the next day, and a few days later, she went to a walk-in clinic to get tested for sexually transmitted infections, she said. The woman eventually took a pregnancy test as well. All the tests came back negative, she said.

She was in pain for some time but “eventually it all got resolved,” she said.

The complainant said she didn’t report it to police at the time because she was ashamed and didn’t even know the man’s full name.

A few months later, she saw Stronach’s photo in the newspaper and knew it was him, she said. “I couldn’t believe it,” she said.

Sometime after making the discovery, she went to Rooney’s with the intention of confronting Stronach, she said. The woman did see him there but was too scared to shout anything at him, and eventually a bouncer asked her to leave, she said. She never saw him in person again.

The woman did go to police in 2006, court heard.

The Crown is expected to continue examining the complainant Thursday, after which the defence will begin its cross-examination.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 25, 2026.

Paola Loriggio, The Canadian Press