Ryan Lochte says he’s “taking full responsibility” for an incident in Brazil that has embroiled the American swimmer and three of his Olympics teammates.
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In an interview with Matt Lauer, scheduled to air in part during NBC Night News tonight, the Olympic swimmer says he takes “full responsibility” for “over-exaggerating” the story about what happened to him and three other USA swimmers in Rio de Janeiro last week. “And, which that’s why I’m in this mess, is I left certain things out, and I over-exaggerated some parts of the story”.
The interview will be shown on the network’s version of the “Nightly News”, called “National Journal”.
Lochte originally said he and teammates Jimmy Feigen, Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz were robbery victims at a gas station while out in Rio following the conclusion of the swimming portion of the Games.
A judge ordered Wednesday that Lochte and Feigen remain in the country and that their passports be seized, but Lochte was back in the United States by Tuesday.
“It was still hours after the incident happened”, Lochte said.
Lauer probed Lochte, saying, “So when you talked to Billy on Sunday afternoon, you didn’t tell him the whole truth”.
At no point did anyone point a gun to his head, and Lochte certainly did not respond by saying, “Whatever”, although we would not put it past him, as he appears to be stupid enough to do something like that.
Police and Bentz said that the swimmers paid $20 plus 100 Reais, which is about $33. Deluz helped translate conversations between the swimmers and security guards.
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Officers from the Civil Police have spoken to the driver today after he came forward, as they attempt to finally get to the bottom of the weird incident that is causing a huge diplomatic row between the U.S. and Brazil. To counter those Lochte apologists, we present none other than Al Roker, America’s favorite weatherman. “Then the second guard drew his weapon and both guards pointed their guns at us and yelled at us to sit on a nearby sidewalk”. We were all frightened, and we wanted to get out of there as quick as possible. “None of this would have happened”, he added about the aftermath in which three of his fellow swimmers were questioned by Brazilian police and one was ordered to donate almost $11,000 to a Brazilian charity.
