In this May 23, 2014, file photo, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice pauses as he speaks during a news conference at the team’s practice facility in Owings Mills, Md. A new video that appears to show Ray Rice striking then-fiance Janay Palmer in an elevator last February has been released on a website.Pat Shea was suddenly a very busy woman late Monday afternoon. The president and CEO of the Nashville YWCA, Shea was sought out for television and newspaper interviews following another senseless act of domestic violence.
She has seen it too many times to count over her 55 years on this earth. But almost never had such a despicable crime wound up on a video vividly showing an NFL veteran knocking out his fiancee (now wife) by punching her in the face inside an elevator.
Yet there it was for all to see, thanks to TMZ. The entertainment and gossip website released the video at 4 a.m. Monday. Within 12 hours the repugnant running back Ray Rice had been cut by the Baltimore Ravens and indefinitely suspended by the NFL.
“I didn’t want to watch it,” Shea said. “It’s awful. But it’s good in starting an important conversation. Some people don’t quite believe those things happen until they see the evidence for themselves. What they saw in that elevator happens every day within the privacy of someone’s home.”
It’s certainly a conversation worth having regarding both the Ravens and the NFL. Maybe the pure horror and shock of that knockout punch stirred a new anger and shame in the Baltimore brass and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell that previously had not been there.