New York Daily News

BIG BLUE IT!

Shaken Mara defends re-signing Brown, says team ‘comfortabl­e’ with it No plans to cut kicker, will be ‘football decision’ Leonard: Giants trade morals for wins

- BY PAT LEONARD and DANIEL POPPER

GIANTS PRESIDENT and co-owner John Mara, looking visibly shaken but steadfastl­y resolved, said Wednesday the organizati­on knew about Josh Brown’s 2015 domestic violence arrest and related allegation­s when the team re-signed the kicker this past April, and that the team will not cut Brown unless it’s for football reasons.

“Based on the facts and circumstan­ces that we were aware of at that time, we were comfortabl­e with our decision to resign him,” Mara said while standing on the porch of the Giants’ training facility at the Meadowland­s. “Nothing has happened in the meantime to make us question that decision.”

Mara broke the organizati­on’s silence on the matter six days after the full scope of Brown’s history came to light, but his admission still came as a shock, as did his comment that Brown’s status as the starting kicker this season will be a “football decision” and nothing more.

By Mara’s admission, the Giants not only knew about Brown’s 2015 domestic violence arrest, they also were aware of the related incident report, revealed by the Daily News last Thursday. In it, Molly Brown told police that Josh Brown had been physically violent with her more than 20 times — and that the violence had begun when she was pregnant with their daughter in 2009. The couple is now divorced.

The state declined to file charges five days after the arrest. The NFL last week suspended Brown, 37, for Week 1 — five games fewer than the league’s six-game minimum for domestic violence. An NFL statement said the league had “insufficie­nt informatio­n to corroborat­e prior allegation­s” due to lack of cooperatio­n on the part of Molly Brown and “local law enforcemen­t officers.”

Mara said the Giants also did “due diligence,” including “a number of conversati­ons with a number of different people.” He said the team was aware of all incidents involving Brown, which include two separate Hoboken Police Department dispatches from 2014 — including one in which Josh Brown, not Molly, was listed as the victim — as well as Brown’s 2001 arrest for misdemeano­r assault while a junior at the University of Nebraska.

While Mara stressed how “seriously” the Giants take domestic violence, including a training program for all employees, he defended the decision to re-sign Brown to a two-year contract despite the arrest and allegation­s related to such “a complicate­d and emotional issue.”

“One thing that you learn when you’re dealing with these issues is that there’s a big difference between allegation­s and

conviction­s or indictment­s,” Mara said. “And it’s very difficult sometimes to sort through all that and make informed decisions. We attempted to make an informed decision. We’ll live with the result of that decision, and we move forward.”

“A lot of times there’s a tendency to try to make these cases black and white. They are very rarely black and white. You very rarely have a Ray Rice video,” Mara added. “There are allegation­s made, you try to sort through the facts, you try to make an informed decision. That’s what we did.”

Mara had an especially difficult time answering whether he should keep Brown on the payroll considerin­g the women in his life, both employees and relatives.

“I’m painfully aware of that,” he said. “I have four daughters and seven sisters, and I know I’ve got to face each one of them. These are not easy decisions. It’s very easy to say, ‘The guy’s been accused, get rid of him, terminate him.’ But when you’re sitting at the top of an organizati­on and you’re responsibl­e for a lot of people, you’d better make more informed decisions than that.”

Mara said he is “trying to be fair to Josh.” He also noted Brown has “been going through counseling for a couple years now.” When presented with the hypothetic­al that “God forbid something else happens” with the Browns, Mara said: “I don’t want to speculate. But obviously, we don’t believe it will.”

“I think he’s trying to do the right thing,” Mara said of Brown. “He deserves an opportunit­y to show that he can do that.”

In a statement Molly Brown gave to King County, Washington, authoritie­s on May 28, 2015 — six days after Josh Brown’s arrest — she accused a Hoboken, New Jersey landlord of blackmaili­ng the couple by threatenin­g to divulge details of the domestic violence history to the media. In that statement, Molly Brown said she turned the matter over to Giants attorneys.

The Giants, in response, issued a statement Wednesday saying “there was no blackmail incident” but acknowledg­ed the team had been aware of a dispute between Brown and his “then-landlord in Hoboken over lease issues.”

“During that dispute, Josh felt threatened by the landlord and her boyfriend,” the statement read. “We advised Josh on how to resolve that issue and referred him to a lawyer to handle the matter.”

 ?? COREY SIPKIN/NEWS ?? John Mara has hands full with Giants, but telling reporters that franchise ‘tried’ to rectify Brown situation isn’t good enough.
COREY SIPKIN/NEWS John Mara has hands full with Giants, but telling reporters that franchise ‘tried’ to rectify Brown situation isn’t good enough.
 ??  ?? Giants prez John Mara remains steadfast in how team handled Josh Brown, who was suspended 1 game for incident with ex-wife.
Giants prez John Mara remains steadfast in how team handled Josh Brown, who was suspended 1 game for incident with ex-wife.
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