Blackhawks fire their AHL affiliate's athletic trainer for sexual harassment?

According to reports, the Chicago Blackhawks fired the longtime athletic trainer of their AHL affiliate -- the Rockford IceHogs -- for sexual harassment.

The athletic trainer -- D.J. Jones -- had his employment terminated in November, according to ESPN's Emily Kaplan and Jesse Rogers, who confirmed the information with the Blackhawks. Kaplan and Rogers report that their sources told them the person was a member of the team's ice crew, and allegations were from an incident that happened years ago.

"Under our new leadership, we have made it crystal clear that nothing is more important than the safety and well-being of our players and employees, and there is a zero-tolerance policy for any violation of our standards of conduct in our organization. We have done a lot of work to ensure an environment where employees are encouraged to feel safe coming forward, even if it is about wrongdoing that occurred in the past," the team said in a statement. "Recently, when allegations of sexual harassment in 2014 by D.J. Jones, the head athletic trainer for the Rockford IceHogs, were reported to the Blackhawks on October 27, 2021, we adhered to our new protocols and procedures, suspended Mr. Jones, conducted an in depth investigation over 5 days and, following the conclusive results, terminated Mr. Jones on November 3, 2021."

The ESPN report said that Jones was in his 16th year with the IceHogs.

In May 2021, former Chicago first-round pick Kyle Beach filed a lawsuit against the Blackhawks alleging prolonged sexual assault by the team's former video coach, Brad Aldrich, in 2010. Blackhawks longtime general manager Stan Bowman resigned in October in the wake of a report by an outside law firm that found the organization mishandled those allegations.

The Blackhawks are currently interviewing candidates to be their next GM.