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US Olympic Committee apologizes for swimmers

The two were taken off their flight from Brazil to the US on Wednesd.

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A case in point: at the 1988 Summer Olympics in South Korea, two American swimmers, Troy Dalbey and Doug Gjertsen, took a large Korean mask from a bar in Seoul. He ran into a few fans on his return flight from Brazil.

Ahead of Rio, though, he was still one of the most recognizable faces on Team USA.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Brazilian police said Thursday that swimmer Ryan Lochte and three US teammates were not robbed after a night of partying, and the intoxicated athletes instead vandalized a gas station bathroom and were questioned by armed guards before they paid for the damage and left.

Add in the storyline of these particular Olympic Games, that Rio is a lovely but troubled city, riddled by street crime, so when Lochte says he was robbed with a gun to his head, he has fed into a narrative that causes Americans to knowingly nod their heads, and proud Brazilians to shudder at the embarrassment. The statement says the athletes are safe and cooperating with authorities.

“No robbery was committed against these athletes”.

Speaking at a news conference Thursday afternoon, chief of civil police Fernando Veloso said the four swimmers’ stories “were contradictory” and the investigation is still under way.

Lochte’s attorney, Jeff Ostrow, previously said there is no question the robbery occurred.

Lochte’s lawyer, agent and father did not immediately return messages seeking comment from the AP. How USA Swimming would react to the situation, once resolved, is unclear.

Lochte first lied about the robbery to his mother, Ileana Lochte, who spoke with reporters, the police official said.

Veloso said it’s up to the courts, but as far as he’s concerned the athletes should be able to leave the country.

Lochte had said he was with Conger, Bentz and Feigen when they were robbed at gunpoint in a taxi by men with a police badge as they returned to the athletes village from a party several hours after the final Olympic swimming events on Saturday.

“They – the security guards and everybody – they are really saying that Ryan Lochte was the one kind of responsible”, Veloso said.

By the time of her order, Lochte had already returned to the United States.

Instead, one of America’s most decorated swimmers is accused by Brazilian police of inventing a story about an armed robbery to cover for some bad behavior at a gas station.

The owner of the gas station is not pressing charges for damage to property after the athletes paid 100 Brazilian reals and a $20 bill for the damages, Velso said.

The official said the swimmers broke the bathroom door and a soap dispenser inside. They trained for at least four years. The footage doesn’t appear to show anyone pointing a gun at the swimmers.

Police have talked with the swimmers’ taxi driver that night, two women who had some sort of interaction with the swimmers that night as well as other witnesses, including the security guards.

The official says that swimmers Conger and Bentz, who were pulled off a plane going back to the United States late Wednesday, told police that the robbery story had been fabricated.

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First, the Rio cops learned on social media that four Americans had reputedly been mugged – a story Lochte told in hair-raising detail to the U.S. media – said Veloso at a press conference Thursday.

Rio incident cuts short Ryan Lochte's commercial victory lap