NEW YORK — Lisa Friel spent 28 years specializing in the prosecution of sex crimes as a district attorney in Manhattan and she is using her experience in law enforcement to direct the NFL on the complex matter of establishing a new personal conduct policy.

Although a new policy has not been established, Friel helped the league take initial steps during meetings at the Conrad Hotel in downtown Manhattan, where the annual fall meeting of team owners took place.

Commissioner Roger Goodell said during a September press conference that that league would want to have a policy in place by the Super Bowl. Friel said Wednesday more meetings next month could contribute to the policy being implemented sooner. However, Friel does not want the changes to happen without careful consideration from internal and external parties.

“I think everybody is committed to doing this in a thoughtful way and not to just knee-jerk and do something quickly that might make some people happy, but would not be the appropriate thing for an ongoing process,” Friel said.

Among the things the league is examining is determining when a player should be prohibited from taking the field. Many states differ in legalities and court structure — such as formal indictments and grand jury sessions — and Friel said there is great complexity trying to get a universal policy in place.

“The owners were great,” Friel said. “They were very, very thoughtful and they didn’t all have the same opinion which kind of emphasized how complicated the situation is. But they were thoughtful and had a lot of good ideas for us and things that we’re going to think about as we go back on it. But they were very invested and participating in the conversation.”

There was not a consensus on how the league would proceed. In the wake of Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice’s suspension for domestic violence, the cases for Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson and Carolina Panthers defensive end Greg Hardy, the prevailing opinion is a desire for uniformity.

“I think there’s a consensus — that we have to be more consistent and we have to do a better job,” Friel said. “That’s where the consensus is now and there’s a consensus that we have to be fair and we want to weigh players’ due process rights against the need to uphold the integrity of the league and of their teams. So where exactly you balance that is the discussion we’re having.”

Another thing that the league is considering is implementing internal investigations instead of relying strictly on law enforcement. Independent investigations come with their own set of problems and detractors.

“If you think of it intellectually, the downside of running an investigation while law enforcement is going on is you may not have access to all the evidence you would like to have,” Friel said. “I was a prosecutor for 28 years, I know what I could get with law enforcement and not because of subpoena power, because the alleged victim came in to talk to me.

“The alleged victims may not always come in to talk to a parallel independent investigation if they’re going through a law enforcement process. The alleged perpetrator may not speak in that kind of investigation because there’s potential criminal liability but there are some pros and cons with what you’re doing and your ability to access enough evidence to come to a fair conclusion.”

Friel is currently the Vice President of the Sexual Misconduct Consulting and Investigations at T&M Protection Resources. She initially spoke to Goodell last month and has spent time meeting with NFL general counsel Jeff Pash as well as former senior advisor Peter Harvey, the former attorney general in New Jersey.

“As we’ve heard, the league has to get its own house in order first and the commissioner has been very honest about that,” Friel said. “The first thing we’re going to look at is the league’s personal conduct policy and how we can educate people about that. In a perfect world the hope is you never have to use the disciplinary end of that policy, that you have your standards of behavior, you educate people about them and they don’t violate your policy. That’s what we’re hoping to do.

“The hope is once we get that all in order and we’ve moving ahead with that, can the league stand on a platform for society. I think we hope so. I think that now we’ve drawn such an attention to this issue that we can do some good outside in society.”