“That’s why I’m taking full responsibility for it”, he told NBC News’ Matt Lauer in a clip posted online.
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Srour also said the matter could haunt Lochte even though the 12-time Olympic medalists left the country before law enforcement officers had a chance to demand money – such as the $11,000 paid by American swimmer Jimmy Feigen to secure his passport and leave the country after the incident.
The two other swimmers, Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger, provided a statement to police, and released a statement apologizing to the US Olympic Team. There was a a gun pointed at our direction.
It was only after police declared the story bogus – saying that the four had only been detained by security and made to pay compensation for drunken vandalization of a gas station bathroom – that Lochte finally came clean.
“We just wanted to get out of there”, he said.
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 US swimmers in Rio de Janeiro last week.
Lochte, in a portion of an interview with NBC’s Matt Lauer that aired Saturday night, continued backtracking from a story in which he initially said he and the swimming teammates were robbed at gunpoint by men posing as policemen. And if I had never done that, we wouldn’t be in this mess. “The gun was drawn but not at my forehead”.
But Lochte’s lawyer, Jeffrey Ostrow, told USA Today that the swimmer was not admitting guilt or that he lied, and added that he still considered the security guard to have “extorted the money” for the smashed-up bathroom. “Regardless of the global attention that this case has had and the false testimony, I say that from a legal point of view. the guards carried out a crime”.
Ryan Lochte is accepting responsibility for his actions.
The 12-time Olympic medalist told NBC in his first public comments since the story unraveled that his immaturity was at the root of what became a high-profile global incident between the United States and Brazil.
“There was a gun pointed in our direction”. Witness accounts claimed Lochte was acting unruly.
“The prosecutors office believes that 35,000 reais is not enough given the gravity and wide negative repercussions of the crime committed by the swimmer”, prosecutors said in a statement received in the early hours of Saturday.
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Lochte appeared on the verge of tears when he described his feelings over being back in the United States while the three other swimmers were interrogated in Brazil. I don’t want them to think I … left them out to dry.
