USA swimmer Ryan Lochte has released a statement apologising for his role in a drunken incident at the Rio Olympic which initially saw him and three teammates tell police that they’d been robbed at gunpoint.
Advertisement
The commission will investigate the affair and could sanction the athletes if they considered their behavior violated the Olympic charter in some way.
Brazilian authorities have accused Feigen and fellow U.S. swimmer, Ryan Lochte, of inventing the story in order to hide an act of vandalism at a petrol station following a night out in the city with teammates Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger.
Ryan Lochte issued a statement on Friday where he apologized for his “behavior” last weekend, citing language barriers and being out late in a foreign country as contributing factors to the worldwide incident.
The attorney of United States swimmer Ryan Lochte maintains his client did not lie about being robbed at gunpoint in Rio de Janeiro despite what authorities in Brazil are saying.
On Thursday, Brazilian sources released surveillance footage that shows one of the swimmers fighting with a gas station security guard.
Lochte broke his social media silence on Friday by disseminating his apology through his Twitter and Instagram accounts.
The United States Olympic Committee has apologized to the people of Brazil and says what these swimmers did was “unacceptable”.
A police news conference added further intrigue to the story.
Lochte’s account of that fateful night (which caused an worldwide scandal after he apparently lied to his mother, and she spoke to the media) came undone on August 18, when authorities in Rio released CCTV footage of the athletes, and witnesses told Brazilian media that the athletes urinated in public and vandalized a gas station.
In the past 24 hours, Lochte has turned into the enemy of not only Brazil but his own country.
The USOC said that Conger and Bentz left Rio Thursday after giving statements to authorities and getting their passports back.
Following the initial incident, a judge had issued an order to seize the passports of the swimmers, but Lochte had already returned to the US. Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentze were originally not allowed to leave the country, as they were taken off a plane to America to be questioned, but they left Brazil yesterda.
Advertisement
The Olympian then begins to detail his version of events that transpired early Sunday morning, defending himself against the Brazilian police’s claims that he, Lochte, James Feigen and Jack Conger had vandalized a gas station bathroom.
