How could she marry him? Why Janay Rice and so many domestic-violence victims stand by their man.

Of all the figures in the Ray Rice scandal, his wife Janay is the most mysterious.  Ray himself?  An irredeemable villain.  NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, who initially gave Ray a paltry two-game suspension?  A coldhearted businessman protecting his bottom line.  But what about Janay Rice, the woman who said “I do” to the running back a few weeks after he beat her into unconsciousness?  Inexplicable.

In fact, 80% of domestic violence victims are back together with their abusers by the time of trial, and don’t want charges brought.  As a DV prosecutor, I saw this over and over.  I’d meet a woman the day of her attack. She’d be bloody and bruised and ready to send her assailant to jail. Two months later, on the day of trial, she’d be cuddling her abuser in the back of the courtroom. “Please, Ms. Leotta,” she’d say. “I don’t want him to go to jail. I love him. Drop the charges.”

If Janay Rice had been mugged by a stranger, she’d wanted him arrested.  But being beaten by a man you love is a very different thing.

Three months after the brutal assault, Janay appeared at a press conference with Ray.  In the intervening time, she’d gone from being his fiancée to being his wife.  She said, “I deeply regret the role I played in the incident that night,” a line which had obviously been scripted for her, and which was promptly tweeted  out by the Ravens.  Ray proceeded to apologize to a lot of people —  including his coach, his fans, and everyone affected by “this situation that me and my wife were in” – but, glaringly, not to the woman he cold-clocked in that hotel elevator.  She sat by him, eerily stoic, ready with her lines.

Here’s my guess.   After Ray hit Janay he was very, very sorry.  He apologized, repeatedly.  He was far nicer to her than he’d been in, say, the year before the beating.  He promised he would change — and she wanted to believe him.  This is the cycle of domestic violence :  after a beating the batterer is the sweetest he can be.  He brings home gifts, promises, and his best behavior.  In this “honeymoon period,” the victim is thoroughly wooed.  She wants him to be better — he’s the father of her child! —  and she wants to be the one who can help him make that change.  She takes him back, hoping for the best.  But if there is no intervention, the tension in their relationship will build again — until the next beating.  And domestic violence doesn’t go away quietly; it spirals upward, with each incident getting more violent and brutal.

But hope springs eternal.  Love.  Forgiveness. Metamorphosis.  Happily Ever After.  In this case, Ray had even more lure than the typical abuser: the promise of a multi-million-dollar NFL salary. The wealth to buy the massive diamond ring Janay wore during that awkward press conference.   The kind of lifetime financial security that few women can hope for—and that Janay, perhaps, could not resist.

Eventually, Janay said she didn’t want to go forward with criminal charges — but the state went forward anyway, as states may do.  Ray was indicted for aggravated assault on March 27th.  He and Janay were married the next day.  This was not a coincidence:  New Jersey has a spousal privilege, by which a wife cannot be forced to testify against her husband, although a girlfriend can. Ray and Janay may have been deeply in love, but I bet the reason they got married was so she couldn’t be forced to testify against him.

But Ray didn’t realize there was video still lurking out there, and one video is worth a thousand pages of sworn testimony.  I’m not a big fan of tabloid journalism, but we should thank TMZ.  Thanks for shining a light where few news outlets, even in 2014, are brave enough to look.  Like the video recording in the Donald Sterling case, this two-minute clip took a snippet of unrehearsed reality and got America talking about an uncomfortable reality that still prevails when powerful men think no one is watching.

I hope the NFL expels Ray Rice.  The league could make big difference.  Courts are a blunt tool – carrying the high standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt” and tending toward probationary penalties even if there is a conviction.  But the NFL has a sharper tool: the tool of public opinion. If Ray loses his job, millions of American boys will see that  this is unacceptable, that no matter how well you play ball, you may not hit the person you love.  That message would also make a difference to millions of female football fans.  Ray Rice says he wants to be a role model, and he should be: by modelling the fact that if you commit such a craven assault—however rich or successful you may be—you will lose your riches, and you will go to jail.

Most of all, I hope Janay is doing okay.