Janay Rice, the wife of NFL running back Ray Rice claimed that the Baltimore Ravens “suggested” she apologize for her role in the domestic violence incident where her husband knocked her unconscious in an elevator during an interview with Matt Lauer broadcast on Monday’s “NewsNation” on MSNBC.
Rice said that the press conference where she issued the apology was “something the Ravens put together,” although she said “fine with it [the press conference].”
Lauer then asked “did anyone at the Ravens say, ‘Janay, it would be really good if you issue some kind of an apology’?” To which Rice responded “they suggested it, yes.” She clarified that the Ravens didn’t write the wording of the apology, but “basically gave us a general script.”
She then stated “I was basically not doing what I was told, but at the same time I didn’t think it was completely wrong for me to apologize because at the end of the day I got arrested too. So I did something wrong too. Not taking any light off of what Ray did, because I agree with everybody else, it was wrong,” although she added that she wouldn’t have apologized or gone to the press conference without the Ravens’ urging. And that at the press conference “we were doing what we had to do to get it over and done with.”
Later in the interview, Janay denied that she was serving as Ray’s “protector,” and clarified that he did apologize to her multiple times.
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