Last Word On Pro Football, by Derek Helling
With the investigation into New York Giants kicker Josh Brown‘s alleged domestic abuse re-opened, who to blame for the now heavily scrutinized initial results is a question in and of itself.
NFL Botched Josh Brown Investigation, Sheriff Says
In a statement on Thursday, the National Football League said that it was unaware of the existence of documents in which Brown reportedly confessed to abusing his then-wife. The NFL also said that it made several attempts to gather all pertinent information regarding the investigation conducted by the Sheriff of King County, Wash., but those requests weren’t fulfilled by the King County Sheriff’s Deptartment.
The King County Sheriff Responds
King County Sheriff John Urquhart retorted on Friday in an interview with KIRO Radio‘s Dori Monson, calling the NFL a bully and stating that its attempts at investigating the incidents were feeble.
Urquhart explained that an individual named Rob Agnew submitted a public disclosure request pertaining to the Brown investigation four days after the Sheriff’s Department began its investigation. Urquhart states that the request came from a personal e-mail and Agnew never identified himself as representing the NFL, and that the NFL still has not submitted a public disclosure request on its own.
Urquhart explained that the documents containing Brown’s confession were not released until this week because the investigation was still open. Urquhart further explained that had Agnew identified himself as working for the NFL, or had the NFL filed a request formally, he would have denied the request for that same reason of the investigation being on-going at the time.
Urquhart insists that he “probably would have told them orally a little bit more about what we had” if the investigators had identified their interest in the case, however. He also acknowledged that the NFL did not have all the information when it originally suspended Brown for only one game.
Why the NFL Investigators Went Incognito
There are two reasons why NFL investigators may have contacted Urquhart’s office without identifying themselves as representing the NFL.
The first is that public disclosure requests are exactly that, public. Any news that the NFL was investigating a player for alleged domestic abuse could have been viewed as unfavorable for the league, already reeling from the Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson and Greg Hardy situations. If the NFL could have gotten the information necessary without identifying itself and attracting further media attention, that would have been ideal.
The second possible reason is that at the time, the known details about the incident made it look trivial. In light of that, NFL investigators may have used unofficial channels because they didn’t think that much would come of the situation.
Brown’s NFL future appears to be uncertain. The Giants have signed kicker Robbie Gould, and Brown did not make the trip with the team to London for its next game. On Friday, the league announced that Brown was placed on the Reserve/Commissioner Exempt List. He will be barred from team activities until the league and his team complete their investigation of the matter.
