Brent might be a bad example, though video might have affected his criminal prosecution. He was probably punished according to the Drug and Alcohol Policy by the NFL and it did not have options under than policy, its controlled by the CBA.
Which is precisely why the Personal Conduct Policy has backfired so tremendously in Rice's case. Because Roger is judge, jury and executioner he has virtually unlimited discretion. And almost no one to back him up except by personal testimonial. The Policy is unpopular with the players so they won't help. So when his 2 game decree was met with near universal derision, he immediately began to backtrack.
Remember, the NFL is always looking for new revenue streams and women are one demo they are targeting. The reason the owners like Rogers is that he has been helping increase revenue by leaps and bounds. This incident is a threat to that. Pink clothes and all.
So while Roger is in retreat, they are vulnerable to other revelations or bad PR. When the tape leaks, they are in a full fledged panic. Yes they are hypocrites, but they are hypocrites because this was never about justice, it was about potential football revenue.
Had Goodell experience outside of football, or had he listened to Tagliabue's critique, he would have a similar system to Personal Conduct that they had for Drugs and Alcohol. He would have had a system to rely on and back him up, plus arbitration or access to courts. Retreat wouldn't have been necessary, They could have changed the policy to issue harsher suspensions to satisfy critics and been done with it.