Ray Rice’s status with the NFL could change in a matter of days after his two-day appeal hearing in front of an arbitrator began Wednesday in Midtown.
League commissioner Roger Goodell reportedly testified under oath for two hours Wednesday morning in front of former federal judge Barbara Jones, who has slapped a gag order on all the participants.
According to ESPN, Goodell was the first witness called following opening statements by the league and the NFL Players Association, which is directing Rice’s case against the league.
Jones is deciding Rice’s appeal of the indefinite suspension Goodell gave the former Raven in September for slugging his now-wife Janay unconscious in an Atlantic City casino elevator.
Jones has not indicated when she will issue a ruling on Rice’s request for immediate reinstatement, but a league source said the former New Rochelle native and former Rutgers standout could know his status by the end of this month.
Rice is appealing the indefinite suspension through the NFL Players Association because he considers it a form of double jeopardy since it followed a two-game league ban in August for the same incident.
Goodell said at the time of the indefinite suspension it was justified because damaging video from inside the elevator revealed by TMZ didn’t match the version Rice of events relayed to Goodell in his meeting with the commissioner last summer.
Goodell also said he had not seen the second video of the February incident until Sept. 8, when it was published online. The Associated Press has quoted a New Jersey law-enforcement source as saying he sent the league a copy of it — and was given verbal confirmation from an NFL employee that the league had received it — last spring.
Rice has disputed through the union that he was less than truthful in his meeting with Goodell, and the NFLPA considers the second suspension a misuse of the league’s conduct policy and a violation of the collective bargaining agreement.
Rice and his wife are scheduled to testify separately in front of Jones on Thursday.
Other key witnesses expected to testify are NFL security chief Jeffrey Miller, Ravens president Dick Cass and NFL lead attorney Jeff Pash.
Goodell and the league had sought to have him excluded from testifying in the appeal, but Jones denied that request last month.
Goodell’s mishandling of the Rice case produced no shortage of fallout, including calls for Goodell to resign and the announcement by the league last month that the conduct policy will be overhauled and most likely removed from the commissioner’s control.