The NFL, who is always seeming to make head-scratching decisions when it comes to disciplining it’s players, especially when it comes to matters like these has made another baffling suspension decision this week.
Reports surfaced this week of Josh Brown’s history of abusing his ex-wife, including times when she was pregnant, more than twenty times over more than a year.
After the NFL, who notably botched Ray Rice’s suspension in 2015 by forcing him to sit out a mere 6 games for knocking out his wife with a punch in an elevator, is back with another seemingly absurd suspension of only one game. A single game.
The suspension comes after a 10-month investigation into his May 2015 domestic violence arrest, that revealed the incident was not even close to the first time Brown allegedly abused his ex wife, Molly Brown.
Molly Brown told police when her now ex-husband was arrested that he had been physically violent with her more than 20 times, including when she was pregnant in 2009, according to The New York Daily News, which obtained an incident report detailing the alleged abuse.
The NFL responded to the news which caught like wild fire with a statement Friday:
“In May 2015, the NFL was informed by the New York Giants of Josh Brown’s arrest for an incident in his home involving his then wife. We began an investigation into the incident and circumstances surrounding it. In the course of the League’s investigation, our investigators became aware that his wife had filed a statement with the county court alleging previous altercations between the spouses. However, despite multiple attempts to speak with her about this incident and her previous statements, she declined to speak with us. We understand that there are many reasons that might have affected her decision not to speak with us, but we were limited in our ability to investigate these allegations. Over the course of the 10-month investigation, we also made numerous requests — as late as this spring — to local law enforcement officers for information on the case and previous allegations. They declined those requests for information. As a result of these factors, our investigators had insufficient information to corroborate prior allegations. In addition, no criminal charges were brought forward regarding the incident in question or prior allegations. The NFL therefore made a decision based on the evidentiary findings around this one incident as provided to us by the District Attorney. The NFL made a finding that Mr. Brown had violated the Personal Conduct Policy. We did so based on the evidence of this one incident as presented in the police report, Mr. Brown and his wifeâs statements to police that evening, and his statements in interviews with the NFL. The NFL Personal Conduct policy allows for discipline to be imposed even when criminal charges are not presented. It further allows for us to consider both aggravating and mitigating factors regarding discipline for domestic violence. After reviewing the evidence in this one incident, we imposed a one-game suspension for violation of the personal conduct policy.
Even more despicable is the fact that the NY Giants resigned Brown to a 2-year deal while knowing of Brown’s domestic violence riddled recent past.
