Lochte is at the center of controversy in Rio after authorities said he and three other American swimmers vandalized a gas station bathroom after partying.
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Excerpts of an interview with Lochte by Matt Lauer also aired on “NBC” Saturday night.
“It’s how you want to make it look like, whether you call it a robbery, whether you call it extortion, or us paying for the damages – we don’t know”, he said.
“There was a gun pointed in our direction”. “You’re striking a deal to pay for what damage you’ve caused so that he doesn’t call the police, and this doesn’t become a bigger incident”.
In that interview, he apologised to his swimming teammates, Jimmy Feigen, 26, Jack Conger, 21, and Gunnar Bentz, 20, who police stopped from leaving Brazil over the incident.
“I left details out”, Lochte told Lauer.
“That’s why I’m taking full responsibility for it is because I over-exaggerated that story”, Lochte said. “We were held, I mean, there was a gun pointed in our direction”.
Lochte told a sensational robbery story to NBC’s Billy Bush; was contradicted by local authorities; then modified the story in a later interview with Matt Lauer. “I was still intoxicated”, he said. “I’m not making that an excuse”. I shouldn’t have said that. “I over-exaggerated what was happening to me”. The gun was drawn, but it wasn’t at my forehead. “I wanted to be there”. “I’ve thought it a cartoon, a caricature, whose time was surely over”.
Lochte kept repeating how “immature” his behavior had been and how sorry he was, and that he was trying to learn from his actions.
“We agree to disagree”, said Roker to Bush, who noted during the segment that International Olympic Committee spokesman Mario Andrada did not want an apology from the swimmers, and that “we haven’t seen the video of the vandalism”.
Now, Lochte’s safe in a place where famous people get away with being drunk assholes all the time-cops have recommended he and fellow swimmer James Feigen be indicted for filing a false report, but the USA can’t make Lochte go back to Rio, so he’ll probably be fine.
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This was the second time since the story broke that Lochte has been hit with backlash for perceived tone-deafness on social media: On Tuesday, the day he returned to the US, he tweeted his excitement about the fact that the hair he had dyed light blue (whitish gray?) for the Olympics would be returning to its normal color.
