Wife of disgraced Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice Tuesday defended “the man I love” in an online post and said his football ban left her “feeling like I’m mourning the death of my closest friend.”
Janay Rice, who was shown in a video released Monday getting knocked out in an Atlantic City elevator by Rice, posted the statement on Instagram the day after the Ravens terminated his contract and the NFL suspended him indefinitely.
“I woke up this morning feeling like I had a horrible nightmare, feeling like I’m mourning the death of my closest friend,” she wrote.
She called the attention to their Feb. 15 fight in the Revel Casino Hotel “unwanted.”
“To make us relive a moment in our lives that we regret everyday is a horrible thing. To take something away from the man I love that he has worked his a.. off for all his life just to gain ratings is horrific. THIS IS OUR LIFE!” she wrote.
Rice’s wife came to his defense as reports emerged of a longer and more detailed video of the elevator scene.
The longer video – reportedly shown to the Associated Press by a law enforcement official – reportedly shows Rice and Janay Palmer shouting obscenities at each other before the confrontation became violent. Palmer later married Rice and changed her name to Janay Rice.
At one point it appeared that Janay Rice spit in the face of the three-time Pro Bowl running back before he throws the punch that left the woman sprawled unconscious on the elevator floor. That video includes audio and shows a clearer picture than the grainy TMZ Sports video that was released Monday, according to the AP.
