New reports are indicating that the commissioner handed Rice the 2 game suspension because he did not want to dig further into Mrs. Rice’s story. He feared that he would’ve come across as insensitive. Hit the jump for details.
The reason Ray Rice was only initially suspended two games by the NFL is because Roger Goodell thought it would be ‘insensitive’ to question Janay Rice’s story regarding the couple’s February incident, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Per the report, the NFL backed off its investigation into what happened between Ray and Janay after Goodell met with the couple in June. During that meeting, Janay told Goodell that she had hit Ray and that she felt partially responsible for what happened on Feb. 15.
An unnamed NFL owner told the WSJ that Goodell left the June meeting with the Rices believing that Janay had become unconscious because she fell during the scuffle, not because Rice punched her. Goodell didn’t push for further details becuase he didn’t want to press the issue with her.
Goodell has previously been criticized for never interviewing Janay one-on-one, only doing so while she was in the same room as the perpetrator of her abuse.
According to the report, Goodell “felt it would have been insensitive to question Janay Rice’s story because it would have come across as an indictment of her character.”
After the June meeting, the NFL toned downed its investigation, and less than a month later, Rice was handed a two-game suspension.
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