Peterson adds to NFL’s woes

Associated Press

MINNEAPOLIS

Minnesota Vikings star running back Adrian Peterson’s booking on a child abuse charge Saturday has created another crisis for the embattled NFL, already derided for not responding strongly enough to acts of domestic violence by its players.

It also has touched off a national debate about the role of corporal punishment in parenting.

In the eyes of a Texas grand jury, Peterson crossed the line when he repeatedly struck his son with a tree branch, or switch, in May. Peterson’s attorney has said he has never run from what happened — and that Peterson was inflicting the same discipline he endured as a child.

“Obviously, parents are entitled to discipline their children as they see fit, except when that discipline exceeds what the community would say is reasonable,” Montgomery County Prosecutor Phil Grant said about 12 hours after Peterson was booked and released from jail on $15,000 bond. He is charged with causing injury to a child age 14 or younger.

Peterson, one of the NFL’s most popular players and widely considered one of the best running backs to ever play, flew from Minnesota to Houston in the early morning hours after authorities indicted him on Friday evening. He has a home in both locations.

The Vikings almost immediately decided to deactivate him for today’s game against the New England Patriots, and NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said on Saturday that Peterson’s case “will be reviewed under the NFL’s personal conduct policy.”

Peterson’s case is complicated by his stance that he meant his son no harm but rather was applying the same discipline he experienced growing up.

“Adrian is a loving father who used his judgment as a parent to discipline his son. He used the same kind of discipline with his child that he experienced as a child growing up in East Texas,” Peterson’s attorney, Rusty Hardin, said.

Steve Eudey, who coached Peterson as a young boy in Palestine, Texas, and has remained a family friend, said he has heard stories from Peterson about his father Nelson “being a firm disciplinarian.”

“Some of the things his dad did to him was to make him tough,” Eudey told The Associated Press.