NFL stars Adrian Peterson of the Minnesota Vikings and Ray Rice of the Baltimore Ravens have been in the news lately and not for their physical prowess on the football field, but rather for their physical abuses off the field. Peterson turned himself into authorities Saturday on charges of child abuse against his four year old son, and Rice became the subject of renewed scrutiny after this week's release of video showing him knocking his fiancée out cold back in February. Peterson has been deactivated for at least one game and Rice released by the Ravens and indefinitely suspended by the league.
Peterson and Rice are in no way the only high profile NFL players in trouble with the league and the law. Carolina Panthers defensive end Greg Hardy and Ray McDonald of the San Francisco 49ers, both have domestic abuse cases pending. Hardy was convicted July 15 of assaulting and threatening a woman, but is appealing and just before today's game was supended. San Jose police are still investigating an Aug. 31 incident involving McDonald. And it was just about two years ago when Kansas City Chiefs' linebacker, Jovan Belcher, shot and killed the mother of his daughter and then took his own life.
Arrests of NFL players have been tracked by USA Today since 2000 and "the numbers show a league in which drunk-driving arrests are a continuing problem and domestic violence charges are surprisingly common." http://www.nytimes.com/...
From 2000 through 2014, 617 NFL players have been arrested for violent or drug and alcohol related offenses.
Some 28 percent of the arrests in the database were for driving under the influence, with 202 incidents. Other frequent categories of charges include assault and battery (88 cases) and drug-related offenses (82). This data is also a reminder that domestic violence has been a problem among N.F.L. players since long before Ray and Janay Rice got on that Atlantic City elevator: There have been 85 charges for domestic violence and related offenses since 2000.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
The Oregonian cites the U-T San Diego's "NFL Arrests Database," to look at the last two years and compiled a list of eleven NFL domestic violence arrests but not including the Peterson arrest. U-T San Diego states that their list
cannot be considered comprehensive in part because some incidents may not have been reported and some public records proved to be elusive. Increased media coverage of incidents also probably accounts for more incidents listed in recent years.
http://www.utsandiego.com/...
This database reveals 2.53 percent of players have had a serious run-in with the law in an average year, but this arrest rate is actually lower than the national average for men in that age range. One only has to see the photos of Peterson's son or watch the video of Rice and Palmer in the elevator to understand that the NFL has a problem with violence, which seems quite intuitive in light of the violent nature of the game of football. But it is also true that domestic violence like that evidenced in the Peterson and Rice cases is probably more pervasive in the general population than it is in the NFL. The NFL's problem is America's problem.
Intimate Partner Violence
While the focus of domestic violence is primarily on men assaulting women, men are also victims. The percentages are a matter of some controversy, especially in light of the Harvard study which found that 50% of intimate partner violence was "reciprocal" and that when the violence was one sided 70% of the incidents were initiated by the woman.
While men certainly are the victims of domestic abuse the Harvard study doesn't appear to take in the severity of the attacks. A study of over 16,000 men and women published by the US Department of Justice in 2000 found that 22.1% of women and 7.4% of men reported they were physically assaulted by a current or former "spouse, cohabiting partner, boyfriend or girlfriend, or date in their lifetime.”
“Violence against women is primarily intimate partner violence: 64.0 percent of the women who reported being raped, physically assaulted, and/or stalked since age 18 were victimized by a current or former husband, cohabiting partner, boyfriend, or date. In comparison, only 16.2 percent of the men who reported being raped and/or physically assaulted since age 18 were victimized by such a perpetrator.”
The study also found that women are much more likely to be injured during an assault, which the Harvard study doesn't seem to take into account.
http://www.ywcatopeka.org/...
In 2003 "the CDC estimated physical abuse against a woman by an intimate partner results in 1.8 million injuries each year, with more than 500,000 of such injuries requiring medical care."
The Washington Times highlighted the case of former NFL quarterback Steve McNair, who police concluded was shot to death in his sleep by his girlfriend, Sahel Kazemi in a murder-suicide. Of course women are capable of assault and murder, it does happen, and men should not be automatically accused without cause, but women are far more likely to be killed by an intimate partner.
In 2000, 1,247 women and 440 men were killed by an intimate partner. In recent years, an intimate partner killed approximately 33% of female murder victims and 4% of male murder victims.
(USDOJ)
The Case of Ray Rice
Curiously Ray Rice and his fiancée, Janay Palmer were both arrested for simple assault at the casino in February. Rice's attorney characterized the incident as a "minor physical altercation." http://www.sbnation.com/...
According to a summons in the Atlantic City Municipal Court Rice was charged for “attempting to cause bodily injury to J. Palmer, specifically by striking her with his hand, rendering her unconscious.” The Baltimore Sun reported the day after the incident that:
Casino security called officers to the Revel Casino at about 2:50 a.m. Saturday after a domestic dispute between Rice and Janay Palmer that was recorded by video surveillance, according to a statement from police. Footage appeared to show both parties involved in a physical altercation. What footage they were citing was not clear.
“The complaint summons indicates that both Rice and Palmer struck each other with their hands,” the statement said.
http://www.baltimoresun.com/...
A few days later video surfaced of Rice dragging the limp body of his then fiancée, soon to be wife, Janay, out of an elevator. He is seen trying to clear her legs from the threshold of the automatic doors as an apparent employee of the hotel approaches. He then repeatedly tries to pick her up until he can prop her into a slumping heap on the floor. It is absolutely disgusting. http://espn.go.com/...
"Minor altercation" my ass.
The Raven's organization predictably fell in line behind Rice. Head coach John Harbaugh defended Rice's character and both he and general manager Ozzie Newsome affirmed the running back's active status with the team. In the enabling tradition of patriarchal institutions Harbaugh dismissed the incident as something to be worked through by two consenting adults and that the whole process was a positive thing.
"The two people obviously have a couple issues that they have to work through, and they're both committed to doing that. That was the main takeaway for me from the conversation. They understand their own issues. They're getting a lot of counseling and those kinds of things, so I think that's really positive. That was the main takeaway."
So Rice knocks his girl friend out cold, drags her from an elevator unconscious and now they know what "their" issues are. That is the main take away? Really? They have a "couple" of issues to work through? What a great opportunity this is for them. This is one of those reciprocal assaults, right? They were both arrested. They both have issues. She obviously did something to make him mad and he knocked her flat. She needs to stop doing whatever it was that made him mad and he needs to stop hitting her. There it is. Let's just call it even. Now how about we get back to talking some football?
I don't think so.
"Police later said that they obtained video that showed that Rice had knocked Palmer unconscious. That footage was not leaked to the public." http://www.sbnation.com/...
Perhaps this footage would reveal Ms. Palmer attacking Mr. Rice and why she was also charged with assault. A little over a month later, even though Ms. Palmer did not want to go through with the prosecution, the charges against Rice were elevated from simple assault to third degree aggravated assault, a felony with a punishment of up to five years in jail. At the same time for some unexplained reason the charges against Palmer were dropped. The very next day the two were married.
On May 1st Rice rejected a plea deal, pleaded not guilty and applied for a first time offenders program that would clear him of charges possibly in as soon as six months. He was accepted into the program and thus allowed to avoid a trial that surely would have been a nightmare for not only him, but the Ravens and the NFL as well.
So it looked like everything was settling down, Rice would serve no time in jail, and all that was left was for the NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell to hand down the anticipated minimal suspension and fine, which he did on July 24 by banning him a measly two games without pay with a fine of $58,000. For some of us that would be equivalent to paying a parking ticket.
This punishment was widely criticized.
Goodell initially defended the two game suspension.
“If it’s a first offense, someone who’s had a strong background of being very responsible in the community, doing the right things and not violating other policies or anything else that reflect poorly on the NFL, then we would take that into account,” said NFL commissioner Roger Goodell.
He added, “We’ve dealt with it in a serious manner, and we’re very confident that this young man understands where he is and what he needs to do going forward.”
http://time.com/...
But by late August, perhaps bowing to intense pressure, perhaps after further review of [video] evidence the NFL decided to adjust its domestic abuse policy.
Goodell admitted that he "didn't get it right" when he handed Rice a two-game suspension, and beefed up the league's domestic violence policy in reaction. He sent a lengthy letter to team owners outlining a six-game suspension without pay for the first offenses, and a lifetime ban for second offenses. The new policy will apply to all NFL personnel, including executives and owners.
"I take responsibility both for the decision and for ensuring that our actions in the future properly reflect our values," Goodell said. "I didn't get it right. Simply put, we have to do better. And we will."
http://www.sbnation.com/...
And then the proverbial shit hit the fan on September 8th with the release of the video by TMZ Sports showing the actual assault as it happened in the elevator. It is hard to tell if Rice uses his open hand or fist, but what does it matter? His fiancée/wife is knocked out cold. Who cares if he used his hand or fist or knee for that matter? And what Palmer actually did to provoke the attack or warrant being charged with assault is a mystery.
Goodell and the Ravens' organization started doing major damage control. That day the Ravens deleted several tweets from the May press conference where Janay said she regretted her role in the events the night she was assaulted. Victim shaming would no longer work in light of this new evidence. The following day Commissioner Goodell claimed to have not been "granted the opportunity" to view the latest video and team owner Steven Bisciotti wrote to Ravens fans: “We should have pursued our own investigation more vigorously. We didn’t and we were wrong.”
On September 10th AP reported that law enforcement had sent the video to the NFL way back in April and had voicemail conformation to prove it. Ouch! Now we know why Steven Bisciotti expressed regrets for not vigorously investigating this incident.
The NFL says former FBI director Robert S. Mueller III will conduct a probe into how the NFL handled evidence.
Adrian Peterson and Corporal Punishment
Now the Adrian Peterson case is a different form of domestic violence as it involves a father's choice to use corporal punishment to discipline his young son. Many Christian Americans defend and in fact practice corporal punishment on their children and cite the Bible as justification, "He that spareth his rod hateth his son . . ." Peterson turned himself into police Saturday after being indicted for taking a "switch" to his four year old son in May. The boy suffered injuries to his legs, buttocks, back, hand and even his scrotum.
The doctor told investigators that the boy had a number of lacerations on his thighs, along with bruise-like marks on his lower back and buttocks and cuts on his hand.
The police report says the doctor described some of the marks as open wounds and termed it "child abuse." Another examiner agreed, calling the cuts "extensive."
http://www.foxsports.com/...
While cooperating with authorities Peterson admitted he did "whoop" the boy with a switch. Peterson's lawyer, Rusty Hardin, stated he didn't mean to harm his son.
"Adrian is a loving father who used his judgment as a parent to discipline his son. He used the same kind of discipline with his child that he experienced as a child growing up in East Texas."
Oblivious to the severity of his offense, Peterson expressed confidence in his actions to discipline his son, and although he might reconsider using a switch, this wouldn't stop him from "whooping my kids." In a tragic irony, Peterson had a two year old son living in South Dakota who was beaten [whooped] to death by the mother's boyfriend just last October.
The photos of the injuries to Peterson's four year old son are disturbing. But there is no known video of the actual "whooping." Likely if there were it would show a large, emotionally out of control man, a world class athlete, striking a defenseless child over and over and over again, the public reaction would be that of disgust and Peterson would be deactivated for a lot more than one game. But the photos and statements from the doctors should be enough to convict Peterson. It is clear that over a dozen lashes were struck.
Many well meaning parents use corporal punishment as a way to discipline their children, and they would take offense if they were told they were actually "hitting" their kids.
My wife is a Child Development educator and has made me very aware of the efficacy of spanking and the semantic differences between hitting and spanking. Spanking is a subset of hitting usually associated with a striking blow with an open hand to the buttocks but sometimes extended to a blow to the hand, knuckles and even to the side of the head. In dozens of interviews my wife conducted with student/parents who spanked their children, they almost all described hitting as something one did in anger but spanking was a controlled response administered to modify the behavior of a misbehaving child. But when asked what their state of mind was when they were spanking their child the overwhelming majority said they were angry. The fact is that dozens of studies have found that spanking doesn’t actually work.
According to research published by Lisa Berlin at Duke University, parents who spank are more likely to be younger, less educated, single, and/or depressed and stressed. Spanking is most commonly used among parents who were spanked themselves, who live in the South, and/or who identify themselves as conservative Christians. These parents also tend to believe in the effectiveness of spanking or believe the child is at fault in a given situation.
The Duke study of more than 2,500 toddlers from low-income families found that spanking may have detrimental effects on behavior and mental development.
"We're talking about infants and toddlers, and I think that just, cognitively, they just don't understand enough about right or wrong or punishment to benefit from being spanked," said Lisa Berlin, the study's lead author and research scientist at the Center for Child and Family Policy at Duke University.
http://articles.cnn.com/...
Berlin and colleagues found that children who were spanked as 1-year-olds tended to behave more aggressively at age 2, and did not perform as well as other children on a test measuring thinking skills at age 3. The study is published in the journal Child Development.
After reviewing decades of research, Elizabeth Gershoff wrote the "Report on Physical Punishment in the United States: What Research Tells Us About Its Effects on Children," published in 2008 in conjunction with Phoenix Children’s Hospital. The report recommends that parents and caregivers make every effort to avoid physical punishment and calls for the banning of physical discipline in all U.S. schools. The report has been endorsed by dozens of organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association and Psychologists for Social Responsibility. resources.med.fsu.edu/vdca/data/papers/pro-res/es001.pdf
Physical punishment can work momentarily to stop problematic behavior because children are afraid of being hit, but it doesn’t work in the long term and can make children more aggressive, according to research by Sandra Graham-Bermann. And it doesn’t teach them how to problem solve and how to make decisions about right and wrong based on anything other that fear of pain. Children who were physically punished were more likely to endorse hitting as a means of resolving their conflicts with peers and siblings. http://www.apa.org/...
There is a study presented by Larzelere and Kuhn in 2005 that presents a dissenting position, "which has been called the conditional-spanking perspective and has attempted to identify conditions under which spanking may be beneficial or, at least, not detrimental to children." http://www.opposingviews.com/...
Their research finds spanking is not necessarily destructive if used occasionally as a last resort and as long as an eight point protocol is followed. Whooping a child with a switch is not part of their protocol.
While their perspective may be in the mainstream of public opinion, it appears to be the minority position among researchers and scholars. Most researchers agree that the contradiction of being told not to hit and being spanked is not lost on children. They are more likely to grow up angry and to see violence as an acceptable method of conflict resolution.
Research has shown that men, besides possessing higher levels of testosterone, tend to have particular genotypes that are more susceptible to violence than women. Genetic predisposition toward violence can be triggered by environmental adversity such as traumatic events, parental influence, family values, and exposure to discrimination, bullying, community and cultural pressures as well as various brain injuries such as concussions (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...).
It is telling that Adrian Peterson was punishing his boy the way he himself had been punished. And Ray Rice's childhood was traumatic. He grew up in tragic circumstances as the "man of the house" because his father was killed in a drive by shooting when he was one, and his caretaker cousin was killed ten years later.
In their two cases there is hard video and photographic evidence of what they did, but most often this kind of violence happens behind closed doors, in secret. Even when law enforcement becomes involved 70% of cases do not get prosecuted because the key witness is the victim who often will refuse to press charges or testify in court. Janay Rice chose not to prosecute and in Instagram posts defended her husband and lashes out at the media. http://www.baltimoresun.com/...
Her reaction is not unusual for battered women who will stay in abusive relationships until someone ends up in jail or dead. Today on ABC's "This Week" former prosecutor and current senator from Connecticut, Richard Blumenthal stated this is the reason prosecutions can be difficult and have to proceed with or without the cooperation of the victims.
Ray and Janay Rice have been together since high school and this may be the only serious relationship either has known. He seems to be contrite. Maybe they will work this out and have a happy and violence free marriage from here on, but the odds are not in their favor, especially now that he is unemployed and likely to be even more angry than before.
Janay Rice is an adult and is afforded the right of an adult to try to work things out with her husband. But Adrian Peterson's four year old son needs responsible adults to act on his behalf, and it appears that is what is taking place. Many children have few if any advocates to intervene before they are permanently damaged.
The Vikings and Ravens will field their teams this weekend and the games will go on as scheduled, just without their star running backs. If it is proven that Goodell and the Ravens knew of the latest video, the NFL may have no choice but to demand Goodell's resignation. The NFL is a huge business and will survive. But hopefully the high profile and timing of these events will prove to be a tipping point in dealing with domestic violence in America. The NFL's problem is America's problem.