The same day the NFL's 32 owners ratified a new personal conduct policy in almost direct response to a handful of domestic violence incidents involving some very high profile players which arose earlier this season, a report emerged that NFL commissioner Roger Goodell may have been less than honest regarding his efforts to reveal to the world the full extent of one of those very incidents.
After initially suspending former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice just two games for his role in a domestic violence assault involving Rice's then fiancée in a casino elevator in Atlantic City - which was caught on a security camera - a second videotape emerged, forcing Goodell's hand and causing him to amend Rice's suspension to an indefinite length of time.
The questions surrounding the sudden appearance of the tape and why it took so long for it to come to light caused many to question the commissioner and the league.
Goodell initially denied knowledge of the second tape, with NFL investigator Jeff Buckley telling NFL security chief Jeff Miller on Sep. 9 that Buckley, and therefore the league, had never seen the tape because he hadn't asked the Atlantic City Police Department for it.
"Again, I never spoke to anyone at the casino or the police department about the tape," Buckley wrote in email to Miller, according to Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com.
The very next day, Sep. 10, Goodell wrote an email to the league's owners claiming that he had asked various law enforcement officials for the tape and had subsequently been denied access to it. (h/t to ESPN)
"[O]n multiple occasions, we asked the proper law enforcement authorities to share with us all relevant information, including any video of the incident. Those requests were made to different law enforcement entities, including the New Jersey State Police, the Atlantic City Police Department, the Atlantic County Police Department and the Atlantic County Solicitor's Office. The requests were first made in February following the incident, and were again made following Mr. Rice's entry into the pre-trial diversion program. None of the law enforcement entities we approached was permitted to provide any video or other investigatory material to us."
During Rice's two-day appeal hearing in New York challenging his suspension, Goodell, while being questioned by NFLPA lawyer Jeffrey Kessler, was evasive and somehow ignorant.
Kessler: "... you said, 'we asked for it on several occasions according to our security department. We went through it, we asked for it on several occasions over the spring, all the way through June.' You see that statement? Did you make a comment like that?"
Goodell: "Yes, I remember that."
Kessler: "Did you ever learn before or after that that in fact no formal request was made for videos about your security department of the police department who had it is that in fact they never made such a formal request?"
Goodell: "[What] does a formal request mean?"
Kessler: "Are you aware that there [are] laws in the State of New Jersey where people can file formal requests for information from the police department?"
Goodell: "I'm not an attorney."
What eventually comes of all of this remains to be seen, but the Mueller report - from former FBI director Robert S. Mueller III - expected within weeks, will further detail the circumstances surrounding the Rice investigation and should prove incredibly revealing.
