Chicago Blackhawks right wing Patrick Kane skates against the Predators in Nashville, Tenn., on April 3. Kane says he participated in the Blackhawks investigation into allegations that a then-assistant coach sexually assaulted two players in 2010 and did not know anything happened at the time. (AP file photo)

A former federal prosecutor has been hired by the Blackhawks to conduct what the team says is an independent investigative review of the allegations in a pair of lawsuits filed against the franchise. In an internal memo sent on June 28, CEO Danny Wirtz said Reid Schar and Jenner & Block LLP “have been directed to follow the facts wherever they lead.”

The first suit alleges sexual assault by former assistant coach Bradley Aldrich during the team’s run to the 2010 Stanley Cup title, and the second was filed by a former student whom Aldrich was convicted of assaulting in Michigan.

Aldrich is from Hancock and was convicted in 2013 of the assault of a 17-year-old Houghton High School hockey player while Aldrich was an assistant coach with the Gremlins.

Before that, he also was reported to have coached with a Marquette Junior Hockey team while attending Northern Michigan University, according to Canadian television broadcaster TSN and one of its senior correspondents, Rick Westhead, in June. No criminal complaints of misconduct have been reported there.

Bradley Aldrich Michigan Department of Corrections photo

Susan Loggans, an attorney who represents the former player and student, had cast doubt on the possibility of the former player participating in the review by Jenner & Block. She said they wanted to know more about the parameters of the investigation, and wanted the opportunity to conduct their own interviews of key former and current team executives.

Asked what had changed, Loggans said: “We agreed we wouldn’t talk about it.”

“But I would just say that I felt as though the investigation was becoming aware of what the real facts were,” Loggans continued, “and I felt more confident that, since they had already heard what happened, that they would, this would just be more of the same of what they already heard.”