Derek Boogaard, the heavyweight known league-wide as “The Bogeyman,” played in the National Hockey League from 2005 until late 2010, before his death in May of 2011.
He was addicted to pain killers for at least the final two years of his career, though quite possibly for longer than that.
You can argue why, or how, Boogaard was unable to get his addiction under control, while other players either never became addicted or managed to kick the habit.
On May 10, Boogard’s family filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against the NHL in a Chicago court for unspecified damages. The statement of claim alleges that the league was aware of his addiction and what drugs could cause Derek Boogaard the most problems, and that doctors affiliated with the league continued to prescribe those pills to him until just before his death by overdose on May 13, 2011.
“He was beginning to show signs of damage (in the 2008-09 season with the Minnesota Wild). His body was starting to get beaten up, and he turned to the team doctors … to treat those ailments,” said William Gibbs, the lawyer for the Boogaard family.
“During the course of that season he was given over 1,000 prescription pain pills, many of which were prescription pain medications. Starting with Hydrocodone, and eventually leading up to Oxycodone, a narcotic pain killer that’s highly, highly addictive.
“In Apr of 2009 Derek was given 160 Oxycodone over a period of basically two weeks … by numerous team physicians, dentists and doctors associated with the Minnesota Wild.”
During his career, Boogaard was entered into the Substance Abuse and Behavioral Health Program — run jointly by the NHL and NHL Players’ Association — on more than one occasion. Upon his return from that program, the suit alleges, NHL doctors prescribed the exact medications that had put Boogaard in the program in the first place.
“Certainly that did happen,” Gibbs said, who also charges that the numerous team doctors and dentists of the Wild and New York Rangers handed out prescriptions without an awareness of what the others had prescribed.
“The New York Rangers were well aware of the issues that he had with substance abuse, yet … he was prescribed Ambien, a sleep aid that had been an issue with him before. The league should be able to monitor what team physicians are giving NHL players, and ensure that these players aren’t being given things they have issues with.”
Boogaard was under contract to the Rangers when he died of an accidental overdose. A post-mortem examination of Boogaard’s brain showed signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a brain disease caused by repeated blows to the head.
The wrongful death suit — first reported by The New York Times after it was filed last Friday by the Chicago law firm of Corboy & Demetrio in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois — also alleges that his role as a fighter left Boogaard with brain damage that made him susceptible to addiction.
Boogaard died at age 28 in his Minneapolis apartment, one day after being given a second, unsupervised leave from the league’s addictions program.
“His brain was not given the adequate time to recover from those concussive traumas,” Gibbs said. “That made it harder for him to deal with those addiction issues and impulses. That certainly contributed to his ultimate demise.”
According to the website Hockyfights.com, Boogaard engaged in 67 fights during his NHL career. He suffered numerous documented and undocumented concussions, his family alleges.
But Boogaard, a Saskatoon native, had been fighting since joining the Western Hockey League’s Regina Pats as a 17-year-old. Hockeyfights.com documents a further 118 fights before Boogaard even played in the NHL.
Should Boogaard and his family have been aware of the dangers of his trade?
“You have to think about what he was warned about,” Gibbs said.
Gibbs argues that the league should tell a young enforcer, “You’re going to sustain concussive brain traumas (that) will make it impossible to control certain impulses for addictive drugs.
“All of that wasn’t told to Derek. He wasn’t told that his brain, at the age of 28, would be deteriorating on a daily basis,” Gibbs said. “There are things he may have known, but there are a lot of things he didn’t know, and did not assume that risk.”
Gibbs has promised the Boogaard family that he will do his best to have this suit tried alone. His firm also represents the family of NFL player Dave Duerson, who died with significant CTE trauma. That case has been lumped into a suit with some 4,200 former NFLers.
No one at the National Hockey League will comment at this time. But what impact will this suit have on fighting in hockey?
Stay tuned, folks. This could be the start of a very long and expensive road for the NHL.