Brazilian police have denounced Lochte’s account as a fabrication created to cover up for the group’s bad behaviour after a night spent partying until dawn, prompting apologies from both Lochte and the U.S. Olympic Committee this week.
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Breno Melaragno Costa, Feigen’s lawyer in Rio, announced the agreement early Friday after meeting with with a judge and prosecution officials at a police station, ABC and the Associated Press reported.
Bentz offered a step-by-step account of the incident on Friday, after several days of conflicting reports about it involving Ryan Lochte and fellow U.S. swimmers Jack Conger and Jimmy Feigen.
Earlier this week, Ryan Lochte told NBC News that he and fellow Olympic swimmers Gunnar Bentz, Jack Conger and Jimmy Feigen were robbed at gunpoint in Rio after being pulled over by a group of men posing as police officers.
“It was clear that much of the population felt humiliated by this false robbery claim and people anxious that the image of Brazil was damaged by this incident”, Mario Andrada, the Rio Committee’s communications director, says in a Portuguese statement obtained by Us Weekly. Instead, they said Lochte had vandalised a local gas station early on Sunday and had an altercation with a security guard.
“I want to apologise for my behaviour of last weekend”, Lochte said as a social media storm gathered over him at home and in Brazil.
Last night, head of USA Swimming Chuck Wielgus put out a statement saying the team “does not condone the lapse in judgement and conduct that led us to this point”, and the U.S. Olympic Committee Thursday night had to apologize to the nation of Brazil for thrusting Lochte upon them. The Olympic swimmer made his way back to the USA on Friday after being held in Brazil to testify. “Through the interpreter, one of the guards said that we needed to pay them in order to leave”, he recalled.
The US Swimming Committee and the US Olympic Committee will suspend Lochte following the incident, CNN reports.
Lochte won a gold in Rio in a relay race alongside Phelps.
Bentz went on to clarify that while a pair of security guards who drew their guns confronted them, there was no holdup, as Lochte previously claimed.
“The swimmer accepted the proposal”, police said in a statement. Brazil and Rio have staged a great Games, and it was a privilege to be there and to represent the United States of America.
The city’s civil police chief, Fernando Veloso, had told O Globo: “The only truthful thing they said was that they were drunk”.
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Andrada said 2.5 percent of the mentions on the @Rio2016 Twitter account since the beginning of the games have been about the Lochte situation.
