Court hears of ‘despondency’ among students after claims against Steven Galloway

VANCOUVER — A University of British Columbia professor has testified she wanted to publicly support students who complained about author Steven Galloway, even after a retired judge found sexual assault allegations against him to be unsubstantiated.

Annabel Lyon, who is now director of the university’s school of creative writing, also told B.C. Supreme Court she felt regret about signing off on an incomplete thesis by Galloway’s accuser, saying the situation seemed to be a “one-off.”

Galloway is suing his accuser, a woman known only as A.B. due to a publication ban, and other defendants, in a defamation lawsuit centred on the unproven allegations, which he denies.

Mary Ellen Boyd, a retired judge hired by the university to look into the assault claims, found them unsubstantiated in a report that has not been made public.

The court heard Wednesday that Lyon then told colleagues she wanted to publicly support the students who had come forward with complaints about Galloway.

“I felt extremely protective of students in my program. Some of those who came forward were still in the programs at that time,” she said.

“I know that there was a real feeling of despondency among the students, that they had not been heard.”

Under cross-examination by Galloway’s lawyer Daniel Burnett, Lyon said she wanted to make a public statement despite Boyd’s probe, while acknowledging she hadn’t investigated the allegations herself.

Boyd’s report, Burnett said, had dismissed all the “ancillary complaints” against Galloway.

Lyon said she did not have access to the report. “So I don’t know what it said about the other complaints.”

Lyon also told the court she had personally written policies about thesis completions after she regretfully signed off on the incomplete thesis of A.B., the graduate student who accused Galloway of sexual assault.

Lyon said professor Keith Maillard was the woman’s thesis supervisor and she was a “second reader,” tasked with signing off on the completed thesis.

The court heard the woman submitted a 144-page portion of a novel in July 2015, months before the allegations against Galloway surfaced.

Lyon said she started but only “read enough of it to realize that it was not complete.”

The professor said she was uncomfortable signing off, but deferred to her senior colleague, Maillard, and agreed to accept the unfinished work in order for the woman to graduate.

Maillard had never asked her to do the same for any other student, and he hadn’t since, Lyon said, so she didn’t think it was a “pervasive problem.”

“It seemed to me a one-off,” she said. “I wasn’t comfortable with it, but I did go along with it.”

Lyon said she offered to read the work when it was complete, an offer that still stands, though she regrets signing off on it “to this day.”

Lyon, who concluded her testimony on Wednesday, said she later wrote policies so nobody would be in that position again.

Both Lyon and Maillard were originally named as defendants in Galloway’s lawsuit, filed in 2018, but are no longer parties to the legal action.

Galloway is seeking damages, alleging his career was destroyed by the sexual assault allegations.

The trial continues in Vancouver on Thursday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 4, 2026.

Darryl Greer, The Canadian Press