On Friday, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice spoke publicly for the first time since he was arrested in February following an altercation with his now-wife, Janay.
On Saturday, Rice’s lawyer, Michael Diamondstein, shared his thoughts on the situation during an interview on 97.3 ESPN-FM in New Jersey.
“I don’t want you to think for one second that I’m excusing any behavior,” Diamondstein said, “but there was more to this story than the public saw.”
In a court summons, Rice was accused of knocking Janay Rice, then Janay Palmer, unconscious with a strike of his hand.
Diamondstein defended Rice’s role to an extent, suggesting Rice retaliated after being hit multiple times.
“This is just a complete hypothetical,” Diamondstein said. “Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, rather than enter into the pretrial diversionary program that he entered into, we hypothetically move forward on the case. Hypothetically, we litigate 100 motions, and the video comes out and the video shows — hypothetically speaking now, hypothetically speaking — shows that Ray wasn’t the first person that hit and Ray was getting repeatedly hit, but just Ray hit harder, fired one back and hit harder.
“Hypothetically speaking, and he gets found not guilty. Is that result somehow better? Is it better for the public? Is it better for the Ravens? Is it better for Ray? Is it better for Janay?”
Diamondstein also emphasized that Janay Rice was initially charged in the incident as well.
Both Rices were charged with simple assault, but the charges against Janay Rice were later dropped. The charges against Ray Rice, meanwhile, were upgraded to third-degree aggravated assault.
“His wife was arrested initially as well,” Diamondstein said. “And the prosecutors, for whatever reasons — I can’t speak for the prosecution — they decided to drop the charges against Janay and simply go prosecute Ray.”
For more on Michael Diamondstein’s thought on the Ray Rice case click HERE…
