Will the NFL, the Raven’s penalty justin tucker after alleged inappropriate behavior?

As accusations arise that Ravens Kicker Justin Tucker engaged in inappropriate behavior with six massage therapists in the Baltimore area, any possible punishment can depend on what a potential NFL investigation finds and how the team’s officials interpret a long-term “zero-tolerance” personnel policy.

Six massage therapists at four advanced spas and wellness centers told the banner that Tucker, one of Ravens’ most popular players and perhaps NFL’s biggest kicker ever, repeatedly exposed his genitals and in two cases, stirred therapists with his penis. Two of the spas said they forbade him to return.

Lawyers for Tucker denied the claims and called them “false” and “false.” The lawyers, Thomas A. Clare and Steven J. Harrison of the company Clare Locke, said that Tucker had never been banned from the two spas and that all the therapists’ claims of his behavior were speculative and unreasonable.

Ravens and NFL refused to comment.

According to the league’s policy of personal behavior, players can be disciplined if they prove to have engaged in behaviors that pose a “real danger” to the safety and well -being of others, or to “undermine or put the risk of NFL’s integrity risk.”

The NFL prescribes a six-game unpaid suspension for more serious violations of the policy, including “Sexual abuse involving physical strength or committed against someone who is unable to give consent.” In the league’s investigation of accusations of wrongdoing against Quarterback Deshaun Watson, An investigator for NFL defined assault in 2022 as “unwanted sexual contact with another person.”

Factors such as a “behavioral pattern” and “offenses involving planning” can also increase the penalty.

Because NFL’s investigative process can take months, If not anymoreTucker’s near future could be left to the Ravens officials. The allegations can be a unique test of a decade-old team policy.

In 2022, Ravens coach John Harbaugh was asked about Watson’s six-game pension after allegations of sexual mismatch with massage therapists.

Harbaugh referred to the Ravens’ zero-tolerance policy for domestic violence that the organization introduced after driving Ray Rice back on video stopping a woman now his wife in a lift in 2014. NFL Originally suspended rice in two gamesBut the ravens released rice, and NFL suspended him indefinitely On the same day, video of the stance was released by TMZ. Almost three months later, rice won an appeal of the suspension and was reinstated.

“I respect what (Raven’s owner) Steve Bisciotti has created here, and (team president emeritus) Dick Cass, really almost 10 years ago,” Harbaugh said. “Basically, we are kind of zero -tolerance.”

Cass told journalists In 2015, after a series of arrests out of season that were not associated with domestic violence, the raven’s “look at each case individually” and that they would “still be willing to take other chances of people if they deserve the.” The ravens refused to comment on more questions related to the investigation of the banner, including about the alleged behavior of the tuckers violated the team policy.

Harbaugh added in 2022 while discussing Watson: “You have to know the truth, you have to try to understand the circumstances, but we have stayed away from that particular situation. When we compile players, when we sign them as free agents, we just haven’t treated it. It’s Steve’s decision and I’m glad we have that policy. “

In January 2024, before the team’s playoffs, Ravens signed back Dalvin Cook for their practice team and later their 53-man list. At that time Cook was facing accusations of an ex-boyfriend that she was the victim of assault, battery and fake jail in Cook’s Minnesota Home in 2020. Cook later said he was “the victim in this situation,“And this last April, he decided the trial with his ex-boyfriend.

Also in January 2024, the Raven’s wide receiver was the recipient of Zay Flower’s subject to an investigation of an alleged domestic assault, but was not suspended by the Ravens.

Baltimore County Police closed their investigation of flowers without charges in February, and NFL later found that there was “insufficient evidence” that flowers violated the league’s policy of personal behavior. He remained entitled to participate in all team activities throughout the investigation.

In March, Ravens team president Sashi Brown was asked if the team had changed its zero-tolerance policy for domestic violence.

“No change in our philosophy and our approach,” Brown said. “Very harsh circumstances, always complicated to us, for the league that investigates it, for law enforcement. And we are not at some point yet … where there has been something (regarding flowers) to act on. … and if and when we get there we manage. But no change on it. “

The timelines for the recent NFL studies of potential violations of the league’s policy for personal behavior show that the process can take months.

Buffalo Bills defensive than von Miller’s four-game pension for violation of NFL’s personal behavioral policy announced in October, 11 months after accusations that he assaulted his pregnant girlfriend.

In 2018, the NFL charged a three-game pension on the then Tampa Bay Buccaneers Quarterback Jameis Winston seven months after the Buzzfeed News reported he had allegedly grabbed a female Uber -driver’s step.

Watson’s first ban on six games in 2022, which later turned into an 11-game pension as part of a solution With Watson’s representatives, the NFL Players Association and the leaguecame almost 17 months after the first of over two dozen litigation was brought against the then Houston Texan Quarterback. Watson decided almost all litigation.

It turned out that Watson had breached three provisions Of the league’s personal behavioral policy by participating in unwanted sexual contact with another person who jeopardizes another person’s safety and well -being and undermines the league’s integrity.

Watson published an apology and said, “I take responsibility for the decisions I made.”

Watson was never officially suspended by Houston after accusations first appeared, but he did not play in 2021 due to “non-damage” reasons. In March 2022 he was traded for Cleveland and signed a five-year $ 230 million agreement, the largest guaranteed contract in the NFL story.

Nfl revised his personal behavior policy after watsons suspension to enable more serious sanctions in the case of non -rapid sexual behavior. According to the league’s new policy, another violation of offenses involving sexual abuse with “threats or coercion” would result in a ban on the NFL.

Tucker, a five-time first-team all-pro, the most accurate kicker in the NFL story, comes from its worst of 13 seasons in Baltimore. He missed eight of his first 27 field goals and ended in 2024 with the worst field target percentage (73.3) of his career. But Tucker ended the season on a recovery and hit all five field goals, including two from 50-Plus Yards, and all 23 extra-points try from week 14 through Ravens’ playoff losses in AFC’s divisional round.

At last week’s season ending news conference, Harbaugh acknowledged the sudden fallability: “Maybe we all saw that Justin Tucker is human.”