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Private Notes
From 1981, Eric Malling reports on the ordeal of hockey player Mike Robitaille. The then defenseman for the Vancouver Canucks stood up to the hockey establishment and won an important court decision related to injuries received while a player. He claimed that he was required to play hockey with an injured spinal cord. In the late 1980s Robitaille became a hockey broadcaster covering the Buffalo Sabres. He retired from most of his broadcasting duties in 2014, after 25 years of covering the Sabres in various capacities.
Steve Podborski - now the chef de mission for the Canadian team at the Sochi Olympic Games - was on a winning streak when the fifth estate`s reporter Ian Parker profiled the young downhill skier in 1981.
Podborski was one of the Crazy Canucks, Canada’s daredevil downhill skiers who rivaled the European racers who traditionally dominated the sport. At the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Olympics, he became the first North American man to win an Olympic medal in the downhill event, with a bronze medal - representing half of Canada`s total medal count that year.
The fifth estate’s Parker went to Podborski`s home in Toronto to interview his parents, both avid skiers, and to the Craigleith ski club to meet the coach who first recognized his talent. Podborski talks about recovering from a serious leg injury, and the pressures of fame and sponsorship. He did not win the World Cup race in Aspen, Colorado that Parker mentions at the end of the program.
But just one year after it aired, Podborski became the first - and still the only - North America to win the World Cup season title for downhill racing. In 1982, he was also made an Officer of the Order of Canada. Two years later, at the age of 26, he retired from the sport.
After retirement, Podborski continued to play a prominent role in the Olympics, working as a commentator for American television networks for winter Olympics between 1998 and 2006. He was also on the bid committee for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, focusing on international relations.
Now he is playing a leading role at Sochi, as the chef de mission by the Canadian Olympic Committee for the 2014 games. As chef de mission, Podborski will be the team leader and spokesperson for Canadian athletes at the Games, and will work with the COC to prepare them for the Olympic environment.
On July 10, 1978, 19 year-old Eric Wilson left his Ottawa home and set out alone in his van for Boulder, Colorado where he was to attend a summer course. Four days later, he called from Nebraska and told his brother he'd had trouble with the van, and promised to call the next day at five o'clock. That was the last the Wilsons ever heard from him. Assuming Eric's disappearance was temporary, law agencies in Canada and the U.S. refused to assist in a search, leaving the Wilsons no choice but to hire an expensive private detective and former New York City policeman Jim Conway.
Beginning with the scant evidence of foul play uncovered by the U.S. authorities, Conway eventually pieced together the details of Eric's disappearance, which led to the arrest and conviction of known offenders Raymond Hatch and Bertram Davis who had murdered Eric in cold blood. Conway had managed with sheer determination to gain the truth from witnesses where Peter Wilson and his father had failed in their search to find Eric. Unfortunately, Hatch and Davis did not receive the life sentences Eric Wilson's family fought for. Instead Hatch served only 13 years and Davis only two as a result of plea-bargaining deals used to reduce costly trials and numbers in overcrowded prisons.
Program awards include: New York - International Film and TV Festival; gold medal in investigative reporting category (1981); American Film Festival - 1st prize (blue ribbon), documentary category (1982); ACTRA awards, best TV program of the year (1981); Banff International Television Festival - best socio-political documentary and best documentary script (1981); Ohio Awards - achievement of merit award (1982) and Anik Awards - best documentary (1981); Academy Award for best documentary feature (1983).
Hosted by Ian Parker and produced by acclaimed documentary filmmaker John Zaritsky.
