The story of the American Olympic swimmers’ mugging in Rio just keeps getting more and more bizarre. Yesterday, Rio police announced that they could find very little evidence to support Ryan Lochte and three swimmers’ stories that they had been mugged at gunpoint in Rio, outside of the Olympic village. And because the police could find little evidence, they seemed to assume that Lochte and the other swimmers were making everything up… because…?? A Brazilian judge ordered police to confiscate Ryan Lochte and James Feigen’s passports so that they could be re-interviewed after there were “inconsistencies” in their stories. The inconsistencies being claimed? Lochte apparently told police that they were only robbed by one person, while Feigen said there were multiple muggers. The thing about that is… Lochte told NBC that there were multiple muggers, right? Right. He said “these guys” and “they.”
In any case, US Olympic officials got Lochte on a plane just at the right time, because Lochte was no longer in Brazil when the police came for his passport. Lochte has already been Snapchatting and Instagramming his return to the US. So the Brazilian police came for two of the other swimmers mugged in the robbery, Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger. Bentz and Conger were yanked off a plane!
Two U.S. swimmers were pulled from their flight out of Rio and detained for police questioning, in connection with a controversial claim that they and teammates James Feigen and Ryan Lochte were robbed at gunpoint during the Olympic Games, PEOPLE has confirmed. Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger were detained, but later released, after boarding their Wednesday night flight. According to Yahoo Sports, they had cleared customs before being detained.
Patrick Sandusky, United States Olympic Committee spokesperson said in a statement obtained by PEOPLE: “Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz were detained Wednesday night shortly before their flight was scheduled to depart from Rio. They were released by local authorities with the understanding that they would continue their discussions about the incident on Thursday.”
The statement added that: “James Feigen is also communicating with local authorities and intends to make further statements regarding the incident on Thursday as well. We will continue to provide updated information as it is appropriate.”
According to local reports, Bentz and Conger were wanted for questioning after police said they suspect the robbery report could be false – an allegation that pits the reputation of Brazil, which has been scrutinized for its Olympic preparations, against the reputations of Lochte and his teammates. (None have been charged with a crime.)
Bentz and Conger were transported to a nearby police station after being detained, but it was not immediately clear if they had representation. The State Department told NBC News in a statement that they were aware of the situation and stood “ready to provide all appropriate consular assistance.”
A Rio police source told PEOPLE: “We just want to find out what happened, and then they will be able to take an airplane home. They are being questioned but are not under arrest.”
“I don’t know that they knew how serious this was, and that they were about to start an international incident,” a member of Team U.S.A. tells PEOPLE. “The feeling was that this was Ryan’s issue, because he was the one who had talked to police the most, but this is a big deal for all of them. Right now, we don’t know what’s going on, but this is serious. They’re in Brazilian custody right now, and that’s something that we have no control over.”
I’ve seen a lot of people question every single detail about Lochte and the other swimmers’ stories, but from what I understand, all of the swimmers were pretty drunk that night. Which isn’t a crime? They were literally hurting no one – their part of the Olympics was over, and they were partying with friends and they got wasted and they didn’t drive drunk, they took a taxi. And that taxi full of drunk swimmers got robbed, and sure, maybe every little detail of their combined stories doesn’t 100% line up, but again, they were probably pretty drunk. Is it just me or are the Brazilian authorities acting absolutely insane here? They’re yanking Olympic athletes off of planes, holding athletes at police stations without legal or consulate representation and publicly raising the specter of arresting and charging the victims of an alleged armed robbery. It really has turned into an international incident.
Update: There’s a second Lochte story today – go here to see. The Brazilian authorities claim that Lochte and the other swimmers lied about everything. Did they? I still don’t think so.
Photos courtesy of Getty.
The plot thickens…as it falls apart.
Two swimmers yanked off the plane. One more, Feigen, who was supposed to be on that flight, having heard about them wanting to reinterview him and confiscate his passport, didn’t show up for the flight, and has been in the wind ever since. His whereabouts are unknown. But, no, this is not sketchy at all.
–TheRealPinky
Maybe hiding out in the embassy?
This whole thing is so very strange
I still believe the swimmers, because I mean, why would they make this up?
To save face? I feel like maybe it didnt happened 100% like they said and told a lie that kept growing. I dont think they expected this to be a big deal considering other athletes were mugged too but made little news.
If they wanted to hide what was going on, why would they speak to the media in the first place though? Wouldn’t they have just kept the whole thing hidden from the media spotlight even if they did talk to authorities? It was the IOC that said this did not happen — the swimmers could have just gone with that story if they didn’t want anyone to know what they were doing. I don’t really see anything sketchy going on from the swimmers’ end. I did wonder why the IOC tried to cover everything up though. I assumed that’s why Locate got on the plane — I figured the IOC was pressuring him to shut up.
@perplexed Lochte told his mom. She told the press. The IOC asked one of the other swimmers if something happened, and that person denied it, so the IOC made their statement of denial. Lochte’s mom said it was true, the IOC reluctantly reversed its position. Lochte did a brief on-air interview with NBC. Then the guys were questioned and made inconsistent statements and things proceeded to get bizarre quickly.
–TheRealPinky
@perplexed I feel the same way. Didn’t this whole story break because Ryan Lochte told his mom about it? I’ve seen people (here and elsewhere) mentioning that maybe they were looking for drugs or prostitutes. If I got robbed doing that, and all they took was my cash (and watches? I can’t remember if they took those or not) and I had a way to get more cash, I wouldn’t tell anyone, let alone my mom. She’d have a million questions I wouldn’t want to answer.
@Emily, Lochte himself said the robbers took his wallet. Maybe he had a whole bunch of documents in there and had to somehow report it?
@Leo, I’m sure that’s possible. I’ve had my wallet stolen, and when I reported everything (included my social security card, which is a very dumb thing to keep in your wallet), I didn’t have to produce a police report or anything.
Even if the athletes are making it up, the Brazilian authorities have to realize how silly this makes them look. Especially with news this morning that a British athlete was also robbed at gunpoint.
@Emily
When your life flashes before your eyes when you are in a sketchy part of a city that you are new to, your first thought might be “mummy”. You dont tell her the part where you were with a sex worker, you tell her that you are scared or to send help if you arent back soon. Remember also that Ryan is not too bright. Also, I had hoped to take this to my grave, but I did watch some of his reality show a few years ago and I can tell you, the guy is a total mamas boy – not that theres anything wrong with that.
The real giveaway here is that the other swimmers not only didnt call anybody, they denied it when the officials rang to confirm mama Lochtes report. Ryan panicked, they didnt. Once they got back to the village and discovered what a big stink mama Lochte had made, they were forced to make up the details. Thats why there are inconsistencies in their stories.
I believe then too.
I also don’t think that the taxi driver is missing, it makes the most sense that he was part of the shake down (that’s how they knew who to pull over).
Plus they’re now saying an unnamed UK athlete was robbed at gunpoint on Tuesday. They better watch out, they’ll be after their passport next.
Hi everyone! I never commented here, but I decied to give my two cents on what goes around here in Brazil.
let me start by saying that I’m not offended at all by the comments here,so far what I read seems to be the case on misinformation of some american citizenships, without intent to offend or harm, a curiosity on how things work in Brazil, which is completely natural and reasonable.Also, a national pride, Why wouldn’t you protect one of your national?
I’ll try my best to explain everything going on here, as well as how thing work here.
falsely reporting of a crime is a crime itself here in Brazil.If they went to the police and said that the robery was true, the police will investigate and try to get the robbers,specially if the victims are foreigners AND olympic athletes (that have an special Visa for the duration of the game, with more perks than the common citizen).Unfourtunatly, they can’t solve everything, It’s not the best police in the world, they work without resources, but they do a good job with what they have. there are corrupt cops, but thankfully they are the minority.Also, foreigners have an special police station in Rio to deal with this, where they have people that speak english and spanish besides portuguese. that police station is laso known to solve a lot of crimes and are commited to doing justice to all the foreigners that are graceful enough to visit our country.and that’s where they went tto report the crime
In the morning of that day, the police had already issued search warrants demanding their presence. they KNEW that they had to talk to the police, insted they boarded a plane. that’s why the passports had to be sized, because the athletes disrespected a judicial order.by boarding a plane they were fleeing. they supposedly falsely reported a crime to the police and for that (which is a crime here in Brazil) they can take up to 15 y in jail.they realised they were in trouble before boarding and even then they tried to go back home, where they knew they would be protected. fleeing a supposed crime scene.why would they leave like that if they were innocent?why wouldn’t they talk to the police
say, Do amercican authorities do it differently? I’m genuinely curious.
the procedure to retain passports/remove someone from a plane works like this here in Bra: they announce the name of the person in the plane if she boarded, quietly they are asked to leave, and then they are conducted to the police station inside the airport, where they have translators and contacts with the embassy.if the person haven’t boarded yet, the authorities let the air company know, and again, politely asking to come with them.
as for all the people claiming they are in a hostage like situation:they have brazillian lawyers with them at the police station and a consulate employee is present as well. they would NEVER be allowed there alone, the IOC, USOC would make sure of that, their local lawyers were there too. hell, brazilian authorities would make sure of that.One of the lawyers even spoke to a local newspaper.this is fair treatment, they weren’t denied it, you guys just didn’t receive the full information.It is a demand in brazilian law and international treats.if the authorities don’t follow it, there are harsh consequences for the country.
This international treat is also signed by the USA. If you are detained in a foreign country, the closest embassy will be there for you, with a local lawyer for your defense, etc.
the embassy will not, however, overrule a country decision. the police seemed to want more information and the suspects were trying to leave? detain the passports.
is our police corrupt? thankfully most of them are not.
we do have corruption, we know it, we hate it, we live with the consequences of it everyday. The best of america is americans, and the same could be said about brazilians, the majority of us wouldn’t support if the police was faking it, most brazilians actually rally and denounce when things like that happen. they way the swimmers were treated is the same way that any suspect in brazil is treated.If they were telling the truth, and the evidence pointed towards that,they all would be home by now
there’s a reason brazilian authorities don’t show all the evidence they have until they are sure: to PROTECT the supposed criminal, they didn’t made all the details known because in doing so without certainty they may cause damage to a probable innocent person.they HAD to make sure they were telling the truth in order to a fair treatment.that’s also predicted in international treats (fair judgment/treatments)
We are far from beeing a great country and an example, but Thankfully, things are slowly changing here, We’ve only been a democracy since 1988 (we lived under a dictatorship since 1964) we still have a long way to go as a society, but implying a country, a country which is known to have impecable diplomatic relations with the USA (and the other way around too,not to say commercial and in turism) is treating citizens as hostages or claiming excess without knowing the details or even bothering knowing the rules of the country is not right. there are rules, and they must be followed.are they offensive to you? Sorry that you are offended, but I’ll stand by the local authorities,
failing to realise that if they were telling the truth nothing like this would have happened.
the generalization made of brazilians and our justice system is borderline xenophobic, but intelligence never lies in those who generalise.I don’t see any stupid people in this board.
I hope I made it clear to all my american Friends how things are working, and why claiming that there’s an attempt to cover this is so offensive.
Brazil as a nation would stand with you if they were telling the truth.
Here in the US, you have to have probable cause or a warrant to arrest or detain someone, which is why so many of the folks from the US are so horrified by the Brazilian judge’s call to detain the swimmers – for us, that is a huge deal and implies that the Brazilians think the swimmers are guilty of a serious crime (which the Brazilian judge has clarified that vandalism is not). I’m not trying to imply a lack of due process in Rio, merely that this action speaks very differently to folks from the US than to Brazilians.
As for the rest… it’s easy to forget that every nation has some form of corruption to fight. It’s just that in the US, our corruption usually comes about because folks are too apathetic to pay attention, and so when confronted with different types it stands out. Is Rio a dangerous city? In parts it is. But so was New York City in the 80s, and yet it was still widely acknowledged as one of the greatest cities in the world.
@loleech: Thank you for your wonderful, in-depth explanation of how things work in Brazil!
I think one of the reasons why this whole story is so strange is because we’re getting news reports with multiple different tones. I’ve read some articles where some people are saying Lochte is using “Kardashian-eque” methods of getting attention, while other articles are painting it as some sinister Brazilian corruption conspiracy.
I don’t think any law enforcement agency is allowed to give details to the public regarding an ongoing case, so of course nobody knows everything that happened in the case. We only know what we’re being told, but we’re being told so many things by so many different people with multiple different motivations, so it’s all just so…..weird. lol.
I tend to think they were really robbed, but I also think they were doing something they weren’t supposed to be doing and were somewhere they weren’t supposed to be ( maybe they visited a “spa” like the American basketball players) and that’s why their stories are sketchy.
“Somewhere they weren’t supposed to be”?Were their skirts too short too? That’s some victim blaming BS.
Courtney, I think Locke meant that they were somewhere the IOC had deemed off limits, which means they would be breaking IOC rules. So, not victim blaming, just one possible explanation as to why the stories seem off.
That’s not what I said. I’m not saying they were robbed because they were somewhere they weren’t supposed to be, I’m saying their stories don’t match because they were maybe somewhere they weren’t supposed to he.
@Courtney:
Locke Lamora isn’t victim blaming – saying they got robbed because they were “somewhere they weren’t supposed to be” – she (or he) is just saying that’s the reason their stories may not add up all the way or appear sketchy, because they don’t want to admit they were in a brothel or wherever.
I don’t see that as victim blaming. LL isn’t saying “well, they deserved to be robbed because they were doing something naughty”.
I saw it more as explaining their behavior…as in, they were sketchy/vague with their story because they were doing something naughty, like visiting a brothel.
victim blaming definitely exists, but this isn’t an example of it.
(ETA: sorry to pile on, I was writing while others were writing the same…)
I think they were wasted at the time.
If they were drunk, they may have VERY inconsistent stories. I will swear up and down that I did not request and then lead the macarena at a wedding several years back, but apparently, I did. My story is very different from my husband’s story of what I call “the incident” and different from my best friend’s version. The common denominator – we were all three sheets to the wind.
It’s sketchy!
They may well have been robbed. Sympathies to them. But it seems highly likely there’s an aspect to it they really would prefer not to come out.
And the Brazilian authorities aren’t Bond villains, for heavens sakes! Why on Earth would THEY make it up? It’s hardly in their interests to manufacture an international incident. Far more likely some silly sports stars did something silly and entitled and ended up being robbed along the way – but they have sponsorships and post-athletic careers to consider so don’t want that bit coming out.
I mean, on one set of threads hereabouts everyone is all about the horrible behaviour of US sports darlings and on another, it’s how dare those nasty third worlders accuse OUR darlings.
SIGH.
Authorities in all countries lie all the time so I don’t necessarily find that implausible. It kind of seems like that’s what a lot of them do in all countries, including the USA, from what I’ve seen on the news. Law and Order is probably the only place I’ve seen on tv where authorities are always good and never lie.
I find it less likely that someone would lie about a robbery, because I don’t necessarily see that on the news all the time however.
@sixer: the Brazilian authorities demanded to confiscate passports over what they deemed to be inconsistencies over a crime. Would you hand over your passport? Would you be okay with being detained?
Also, why would the Brazilian authorities make it up? A couple of plausible reasons: 1) they were robbed by actual police officers or 2) the police find it better for their image to deny that no crime happened in the first place.
Remember, these men did NOT go to the police themselves initially. The police got involved because they heard the news reports and came to interview the swimmers.
Brazil authorities are corrupt AF.
@bridget I would never hand over my passport. At least not voluntarily. This happened to me once at the Nairobi airport: the airport officials tried to confiscate my passport (said I wasn’t allowed to fly to Switzerland, even though I was a resident there and had proof + as a Canadian I can go there anyway as a tourist, don’t need a visa). I went nuts, held up the entire line and told them to call the Canadian embassy because there was no way I was letting go of that little blue book and end up rotting in some kenyan cell. Eventually they let me through.
If I were those swimmers I would want to get the hell out of there. The important aspect here is that they were robbed, period. I’m willing to believe that there is some aspect to this the swimmers did not disclose, but they were also drunk as hell and admitted that. Speaking from personal experience, the Brazilian authorities are sketchy as hell and I wouldn’t want to hand over my passport to them for all the money in the world. Boarding an aircraft just to pull off two people over an allegedly false police report? That’s not investigating, that’s harassment. If they put half as much effort into tracking down native Brazilians who commit violent crimes on a daily basis their country would be better off.
Bridget – I didn’t really mean to say of course it isn’t any problem with police. Could well be! But it’s equally likely there is shadiness with the athletes too. I think I’m more reacting to yesterday’s thread, which was a mess of ugly exceptionalism, jingoism and ignorance, as noted by others below. Seems like one can criticise or doubt an American athlete in a DOMESTIC incident but not if it involves nasty, obviously backward, Johnny Foreigners.
Just redressing the balance as some others are below, I suppose. It’s unusual for a comment thread on this site to descend into the unpleasant American stereotype so I suppose I just got my hackles up.
I don’t think anyone comes out of this smelling of roses, to be honest.
@Sixer: people say stupid things all the time, but it’s our choice to engage, you know? A few folks said some silly things, but it’s pretty balanced out by other folks saying silly things about Americans.
Ultimately, it comes down to this for me: if the IOC is on one side, and just about anyone else is on the other, I’m going with just about anyone else. Is it a shock that we discuss corruption when we talk about one of the most corrupt entities?
LOL @ Bridget! I hear you. I think we are both highly aware of the IOC as a highly undesirable organisation. I have a friend of a friend of a friend who is working on Hungary’s bid for 2024 and you should HEAR the stuff coming from him. It’s as corrupt as hell and as obnoxious and prejudiced as hell, too.
In this particular case, though, and my annoyance at some commenters aside, I’d be inclined to agree with the posters below:
Lochte, unintentionally because it went secondhand via his mother, announced that it might have been Brazilian police who robbed him.
Brazilian police are taking this much more seriously than they would a standard mugging because there is a reputation for corruption.
The swimmers – for reason or reasons unknown – can’t give a straight story and video evidence counteracts even the parts of the story they agree on.
Is it a reason to confiscate passports? Probably not. Have the athletes got something to hide? Not necessarily but quite possibly.
@sixer: what do you bet that the reason Lochte thought he would get in trouble was because the IOC made it clear that if athletes are mugged outside the village that it’s to be handled as quietly as possible?
Now THAT, I hadn’t thought of! Entirely plausible! He gobs off to his mother and then the sh!t hits the fan because she goes all, “Woe! Woe! This happened to my precious boy!”
Ok Bridget. You win!
Thank you, Sixer.
The amount of prejudice concerning this matter is astounding and it saddens me because those of us from “third world countries” have laws too, and no one is better than us. No one can come to our countries and do whatever they want without consequences. Hell, Justin Bieber can’t come to Argentina because his team assaulted a man outside a night club and when asked to come in for questioning he blew off OUR laws and went away. Now he will have to testify at the Argentine Consulate in California.
Perhaps they were mugged, perhaps they were not. No mugger/s would point guns at you and only take the cash. That’s not how it works – they take all your valuables and that includes mobile phones, especially because of how easy it is to deactivate their GPS.
LOL, I could be wrong still.
I take back my concession, Bridget!
Now it seems as though we have a load of drunk athletes causing criminal damage to a business and the “robbery” was actually the business’s security guards making them pay for the damage they caused. Then one athlete tells his mother a tall story and the mother broadcasts it to the world at large, leading to more tall stories.
But the IOC would equally want THAT kept quiet, so I think we should say that we are a score draw!
Human Rights Watch and Amnerty International both released reports on police killings in Rio just before the games began. Police corruption is a serious and deadly issue in Rio. I would be terrified to be in police custody.
https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/07/07/good-cops-are-afraid/toll-unchecked-police-violence-rio-de-janeiro
In which case, Megan, presumably you would avoid committing a crime while in Brazil?
Good grief, is that what happened? Well, I would never have guessed that’s what actually transpired. This is truly one of the most bizarre stories.
One thing’s for certain: if you want to keep something quiet, don’t tell Mama Lochte. Why on earth did these idiots say they were robbed?
@sixer I completely agree with you. There is something very sketchy about the swimmers account of that evening. Although Brazil’s government is corrupt, I think they are just trying to get the story straight.
Bridget – heaven only knows why Lochte told his mother that. He should probably get an award for Dumbass of the Year or something! The others, I suppose, just had to go with the tall story once it was out there and Lochte had gone on TV with all his gung-ho and I-was-so-cool-about-it-I-just-said-whatever fantasies. It was honestly the bigging himself up that made me think the whole thing was smelly from the get-go.
@Sixer
I also agree with you. And given the bad reputation of Brazilian police, couldn’t they abide by the rules and not going around like jerks in a place where maybe they shouldn’t have been? I’ve been to South America only once but we had a couple of strange ‘events’ that made us regret to be there in the first place.
This is not victim-blaming, it’s just being aware of the current political climate or social situation in any country you visit (as I wouldn’t go half-dressed in a mosque in Iran or a Catholic church in Italy…).
@Sixer: I said this at the very bottom of the page, but they likely thought they were being robbed. The accounts of the actual damage had been varied, from them kicking in a door, to them completely trashing the place, but I’m guessing that when the security guard told them to pay up to cover the damage, they didn’t understand a word and their drunk butts thought they were being robbed.
@Sixer I was responding to your assertion that Americans consider the Rio police “nasty third workers” when there is, in fact, ample evidence to be suspicious of the Rio police due to corruption, murder, and extortion.
Pinky- you assumed that they were lying from the start for some odd reason. If I was an attorney, with the way Rio is acting, I would not tell my client to give up their passport when they were not charged with any crime. Rio is being shady and him not being openly willing to be detained by a police forced that likely robbed him in the first place is not ‘sketchy’- it’s smart. Americans act like every country has our protections and they do not. My sister & father were ‘mugged’ by police in Mexico. They asked them for their info and then said that it would take cash to get it back. They gave the cash & that was it. It was a scary experience for them though to be held & threatened by the police. Would they then be open to getting arrested by the next officer who came along trying to cover for his friend? This is a more likely scenario then all these stupid theories about what the guys were doing.
@MC2 Since you wrote to me directly, I will respond to you directly as well. News broke that the boys have been lying all along, and destroyed a gas station bathroom. They tried to attack the security guard, who drew his gun and ordered them to pay for the damage. The boys came back and tried to cover for why they were out of cash and their lie got away from them. #LochMess.
I’m not sure why you’re getting on my case about my not believing their fishy story, or why I thought their behavior was sketchy. Did you perhaps misinterpret my comment? If not, you should read my other posts, where I said much the same as you–I’d try to get out of dodge as well if someone was trying to confiscate my passport. But in the end, I retracted my defense of the MEN when I learned what they really did to cause all this trouble.
Pinky- That really did fall apart today! I really thought that they were telling the truth and why would they lie?! Stupid drunk jocks being stupid drunk jocks….I do bet that Ryan & his friends were scared by the security that had them sit & give up their cash. I bet they just thought that they could destroy & pee on property for someone else to clean up without any repercussions.
I was reading comments yesterday that reminded me of the blaming that I hear women get when they come forward after a crime (down to the cheating, drugs, must be something nefarious they were doing) and reacted with too much sensitivity so I apologize that I jumped on your comment. I’ve been hearing so much victim blaming lately in the media geared towards true victims that my head is spinning.
I, too, retract my support of the guys. What idiots…..
There’s also video evidence that shows the swimmer using the bathroom at the gas station. The swimmers paid for damage done at the station & their stories have changed. It appears they lied to the police & if so there may be charges. It sounds like stupid drunken activities that not so bright individuals made worse by lying to and about the authorities. If this is true it makes the IOC and the US look foolish. Lochte will be fine because there’s no way his lawyer will let him go back to Rio. Maybe he’s bright enough to keep his mouth shut but he already spoke to Matt Lauer and changed his story so small chance there.
I bet the other two swimmers are furious that Lochte got out of the country before them and will not think that’s a coincidence…
I believe their telling the truth. Lochte talked to Matt Lauer and told him that they were indeed robbed. I’m not going to write down the whole interview so if your interested you can google it. A few things changed in his story like the gun wasn’t pointed at his temple but toward his body. Rio is trying to make a big deal out of this because they want to look squeaky clean. Crime is very high in Rio (& IOC) and they want people to think that it’s all great and the USA swimmers are lying and bring to put Rio look bad. What Rio did to their own people for the Olympics is an atrocity.
Notice…. no one is talking about Phelps. All the attention is off Phelps and his Historic Wins at the Olympics.
Im not a conspiracy theorist, however its just a little interesting to watch how quickly the focus is pulled.
Firmly believe something Did happen to the guys but under less than savory circumstances on their end. The truth is somewhere in the middle. Sad thing is… ot looks bad for both countries regardless.
Is it just me or are the Brazilian authorities acting absolutely insane here?
No the Brazilian police are doing their job. I hope the Americans confess to what really happened.
They’re overstepping their mark if they are interrogating them without lawyers or counselate representation. If anything, it is just making Brazil look worst for how their are handling everything.
When police in the US bring people in for questioning who are not people of interest, they are not read their miranda rights because they are not suspects and whatever information they give is presumed to be voluntary. You can ask for a lawyer at any time, but they will remind you that you are not under arrest.
I don’t know the laws of Brazil, but in regard to US law, they are not overstepping on that front. However, confiscating passports and bringing people in as though they were suspects, just to ask more questions? That’s extreme, and if I were those kids (who are all of age and should therefore be aware of their rights under US law), I’d be demanding representation–a lawyer, or a consul, or to be taken to my embassy. And I, like Feigen, would be getting out of dodge. No petty robbery (or whatever it really was) would be worth this James Bondian, Tom Hiddlestonian international incident.
In the US if you aren’t under arrest, you can leave. I guess it’s different in Brazil?
I’m sorry Jessie but this is how the US treats foreigners, too.
You all think the US is perfect, but it’s not. I’ve known people in the US held in cells for HOURS without a phone call to their Embassies just because their names match some mysterious list they will tell you nothing about.
@Cee: It’s a bit much & Brazilian authorities are going way overboard here about a mugging the swimmers didn’t even initially report to the police. The police had to come to the Olympic Village to interview them after they heard reports of it, remember? So you think it’s totally normally to yank two swimmers off a plane because of some inconsistencies given by statements from two other swimmers? It’s not. Stop pretending it is. Brazil is making an international incident over something that occurs every day… every day in their country, every day in every country! Crime exists everywhere, people pose as cops everywhere and oh, there are dirty cops everywhere.
And we all now the US is far from perfect but I will tell you I still prefer the US laws. Sorry, that’s the truth. At least I know I am protected by the Constitution here and won’t be thrown in prison for days like in some South American countries for petty crimes.
I take back my concern for them being pulled off the plane. There’s a good reason why they were, as it seems now that they’re suspects in vandalism, destruction of property, etc.
–TheRealPinky
…at a gas station where the owner initially said he never saw the swimmers.
In French news, it is reported that the swimmers had the assistance of two consulat and IOC representants.
Cee, agree with what you said in your post.
It’s not just you. Things aren’t exactly laid back in the authorities department in Brazil.
Aren’t the Brazilian police notorious for being crooked, not taking care of their own citizens etc?
Why do you say that the Americans need to confess? Confess what?
Since when do people who are alleged victims of a crime get detained like this? The Rio police are being told to do this because it is in their best interest to make the US swimmers look like liars because of the embarrassment of Olympic athletes getting robbed during the Olympics. The only thing that was claimed to be stolen are personal effects of the swimmers, so if they aren’t making a big deal about this, the police have no right to detain anyone from leaving the country. Or at least in a country with decent human rights this would be the case.
Can you imagine being mugged in New York City and then when you want to leave the country the police detain you at JFK? It would never happen. They are revictiminzing the victims.
Since they were in a foreign country, that’s when
“Can you imagine being mugged in New York City and then when you want to leave the country the police detain you at JFK? It would never happen. They are revictiminzing the victims.”
THIS. They aren’t suspected of committing a violent crime and fleeing prosecution, they are suspected of giving a false report to the police regarding a crime that allegedly happened TO THEM. This is crazy!
Can authorities even legally confiscate your passport if you’re not a citizen of that country??
@ Dani, I’m not sure about Brazil, but, generally, yes, in some countries there are cases where it’s perfectly legal to do so.
@Dani
It’s legal in Italy too, if you are charged with a crime. Before being charged… hmm not sure it’s legal……
This is very important to them because this was Brazil’s chance to promote tourism and bring in tons of money. Unfortunately, all it has done is clarify, to the rest of the world, that Brazil is dangerous and tourists should stay away. I’m sure the authorities would love to disprove it.
@Decorative Item
Most of South America is like this, so if you want to stay away from danger you might want to avoid the whole continent…. I’d like to visit many countries in SA and elsewhere but I’ve been deterred from doing so because of such reports of crime and general corruption.
Just because they can’t prove a crime did happen doesn’t mean it didn’t. Brazil is playing this wrong. An incident that would have been quickly forgotten has now become a big deal because Brazil is making it one.
Yup. I went from thinking that Brazil has bad crime to thinking not only that, but that Brazilian police will punish tourists for reporting crimes. I am 1 million percent less likely to ever visit Brazil…
No one was physically injured and there is no chance of recovering the stolen property so why peruse the matter? Because the police in Rio were embarrassed, because the Brazilian government was embarrassed? Trying to save face is costing Brazil big time.
Unfortunately, this is really common in countries with major tourist industries. If you are a tourist and go to report a crime, the police will often try to convince you to not file a police report because a) it’s more work for them, and b) it gives the country bad publicity.
Exactly. The story is no longer about how these guys were robbed in a city infamous for its violence and corruption. That would have blown over in a couple of days if they’d said “we’ve received the report and are looking into it.” It’s not as if crime in Rio is a new story. People have been questioning the decision to have the Olympics in Brazil since the decision was made. So they get a little more egg on their faces. Suck it up and move on. Let the story die. Collective memory is very short. It would have been forgotten. But now the story is about Brazilian authorities pulling Olympic athletes off planes and seizing their passports. No one is going to like that. Now it IS a big deal.
For a place where murders and mugging a are just part of an average day…this is totally outlandish!!! Taking their passports and bringing them back in for questioning..it’s totally absurd. These guys just probably want to be be home…
“For a place where murders and mugging a are just part of an average day….”
Are you an American? I find it pretty ironic for an American to be dissing violence in other countries. Do you read the news in your own country?
How does that negate the fact that its a regular occurrence in Rio? Kimma didn’t say the entire country is like that, they’re referring to Rio and its true. I’m an American and in the bulk of the country you can walk around anywhere anytime safely. There are also parts of cities, like Rio, where you shouldn’t even stop at red lights.
@Mich – there are about 16,000 murders a year in the US and about 60,000 a year in Brazil.
So what? There are parts of America where stopping at red lights can be dicey. Rio is a city of over six million people.
As I have said repeatedly throughout this diary, Lochte told the world that he might have been robbed by police. That is a serious charge and Brazil seems to be taking it seriously. You don’t get to say “police in Brazil are corrupt!” and then claim that trying to root out that corruption just proves it.
Tourism is a major industry in Brazil – and Rio in particular. What Lochte told the world had serious implications.
@Mich You just totally ignored my point and tried to make it sound like you came up with my argument but it was in your favor lol you’re arguing that Americans are biased, I made a point proving I am not disillusioned that our system or country is perfect. Washington DC is a city of over 7 million people and crime is lower. It may suck to admit that crime is more prevalent in Rio but its a fact. If they were trying to root out corruption, they would establish a dialogue with the American swimmers and allow them to return home to continue the investigation from there. Detaining them and seizing their passports, plus statements from the judge, implies that they are being punished and treated as criminals themselves. You just made the point yourself, tourism is valuable to Brazil. I don’t think they realize they are drawing more attention to their crime rate by pulling alleged victims of crime off of airplanes and holding them in the country against their will.
Other athletes have also been mugged, and as the result of one being held at gunpoint the Great Britain Olympic Committee is advising athletes not to leave the village.
Also, I’d personally LOVE to see an example of Brazilian police, on orders of a judge, tracking down the SUSPECT of a minor crime (let alone a violent one) and pulling them off of a disembarking aircraft. It doesn’t happen. If they tried so hard to track down actual perpetrators of real crimes they wouldn’t be in the position of having to defend themselves.
Mich – it’s not unlikely that they did get robbed by police. In Mexico, the police are just as crooked. My husband and his friends were pulled over in Mexico in 2010 by police (with valid badges and uniforms) and robbed of all their cash, jewelry and cell phones. It was reported and ended up turning up that it actually was police who robbed them. They were compensated by officials in order to be silenced because it happened on the strip of hotels in Cancun and is frequently happening to tourists till this day. It’s highly likely that Rio is just the same.
@Mich there are no places in the states were stopping at a red light can be dicey. Poverty and crime in Rio isn’t at the same level as it is even in the inner cities in the US.
@Luca76, I don’t think that’s true. I’m from Detroit, spent 5 years in Oakland, and a year in Chicago. In Oakland there was actually a sign on the freeway for an exit telling us not to stop or get off there due to crime. Those places exist, its just less widespread than in Rio. I spent a year in Rio and it was harder to find safe places in the city than in any of the other three.
@Anon I guess I’m sheltered. I know there are spots in the US like South Side of Chicago, Detroit etc with high crime and murder rate but I don’t think statically they are comparable to a city like Rio.
Anon: you must be new to the Internet. If you’re American, you are not permitted to breathe a single word of opinion about problems in another country. Don’t bother prefacing it by acknowledging that Ameica has problems, too.
Comments here have actually been pretty mild. Most comments I’ve seen on this story in other places have said its a shame the robbers didn’t finish the job, the only good American is a dead American, etc.
Starkiller, most people react that way when foreigners ( who have often never been to the country they’re speaking of) speak very negatively and stereotipically about their country. I saw in a thread a while back people jump all over a commenter because she/he dared to say that Americans aren’t the most charitable country in the world.
Thanks All. My point really was that if they were really this diligent about every petty crime there..maybe Brazil it would be a safer place. Meanwhile they are using these olympic kids (because let’s face it..they are really just kids) as some sort of example for who knows what. It just is nonsensical.
EXACTLY +1000
isn’t Lochte 32??? Because let’s face it: 32 is NOT a kid, come on!
I dont think the Brazilian authorities are acting insane. Theres something dodgy about this.
If this had happened in America, i dont think anyone would accuse them of acting cray
If this had happened in America the police would have asked them if they wanted to file an official report. If they said no, that would have been the end of it.
I would believe about anything in regards to Lochte. Who knows, but I think the Brazilian authorities are ticked about the American media giving them bad coverage for various things. They want to save face, but it will likely backfire. That or it’s just straight but corruption!
I think they did lie…about what they were really up to. They can’t exactly admit they were trawling for or in the middle of sexual congress with sex workers when they were mugged. The authorities know that and they are using it to save Rio 2016s reputation. It’s poker and Ryan tried to call their bluff by hopping on a plane so fast.
But if that was the case, why would Ryan have first thing called to tell his mom he was robbed? Wouldn’t they all have just keep their mouths shut?
I don’t get that part either. Why would Ryan Lochte’s mom even be talking to the media if none of this happened?
How about this – they were in fact robbed, but robbed while doing something illegal or something they would have gotten slammed for by the public and their sponsors – like trying to score drugs or visiting prostitutes or “trannies”.
They lost things they couldn’t do without – ID’s or credit cards, say – but couldn’t actually tell the truth about what happened. So they started lying and the story got out of hand.
But why tell the media? They could have lied to whoever is the head of Team USA but it doesn’t make sense to talk to the media or have your mom talk to the media if you want to hide what you were doing. I don’t find it unbelievable that as athletes they could, in general, be up to looking for sex, but if you don’t want anyone finding out why would you say anything to the media? Wouldn’t you just be more willing to say “nothing happened” like the IOC initially did? and then the whole thing would have dropped by news outlets.
@perplexed, like Pinky said up-thread, Lochte’s mom told the press. Things just snow-balled from there.
But according to the comments below it looks like a crime wasn’t even reported to the Brazilian authorities. Why would their passports be yanked simply because Lochte’s mom answered a reporter’s question?
@leo that’s my theory too they were robbed either in a drug deal or trying to get sex workers. I still think Brazil is reacting horribly.
Exactly. Makes no sense. If they were trying to get drugs or prostitutes and got robbed by those people, all they would have had to do was keep their mouths shut and chalk it up to a learning experience. If it was about losing IDs and such, they could have just said they left them in the taxi, or the taximan robbed them. Why make up a huge story if they were trying to keep things quiet?
That still makes no sense. If that’s the case, why tell your mom anything in the first place? The inconsistencies in the story can be explained by them being really drunk and or the cabbie being in on it.
What should have been a basic story of “guys get robbed” – a street crime where no one was hurt – has turned into an international incident with passports being confiscated and people being detained. It’s a big deal because the Brazilians PTB made it one.
OMG, it’s so incredible how the law actually works in other places outside America, right?
There are strong evidences, like a video, they actually reported a false crime. Why? Only they can tell. The false report of a crime is a crime. I wonder how the american police would act if someone claimed to be robbed and it was a lie. Wait, that would never ever happen in America, the safest place in the world and how dare a shitty country question your prerrogative of disrespecting the law, right? Waiting patiently for you to bring freedom and democracy to us.
+1 the wonder
In a high-profile case like this, I am sure these athletes would be treated to the best of American legal principles: innocent until proven guilty.
But none of them reported the burglary to any authority in Brazil. So they in fact did not report a false crime to authorities. They may be guilty of making up the story. But they are definitely not guilty of falsely reporting a crime to Brazilian authorities.
Difference is, local authorities can’t just come and yank someone leaving the country off a plane for seemingly no legitimate reason. (Questioning about inconsistent statements they made about a crime they said someone else committed against them but they weren’t complaining about?) There are laws and procedures in place for detaining people. Warrants in the US are usually reserved for suspects. So, unless these guys are suspects, this does seem like a step too far. Otherwise, people are free to leave and the US has to go through the trouble of asking them to return or asking their countries to extradite them, etc. I think.
–TheRealPinky
@ Pinky. A judge had ordered them to stay. They were following the rules of law in taking them off the plane.
I think that’s the point though, imagine if you were visiting NYC and gave statements to the police regarding an alleged mugging that occurred against you and they found inconsistencies. They wouldn’t order your passports seized and pull you off a plane. NOT for something that small. If you were the suspect in a brutal murder maybe, or if you gave inconsistent statements in the middle of a murder investigation. Not over a small mugging that happens literally everyday in Rio.
You know they didn’t report the crime with the police, right? The police came to them after reading about it in the news
Not to mention, what kind of evidence are you expecting to see? A selfie of them with a mugger? They came in a couple of hours later than they were supposed to have, but that’s absolutely not evidence they weren’t robbed.
All this for what is ultimately a fairly small crime. They were robbed of some cash, and we’re likely a part of a common scam. No one was hurt. They didn’t even want to file a police report. And yet now people are bring detained and it’s turned into an international incident.
Rio doesn’t have enough to worry about?
Lochte’s story keeps changing. That’s a fact. I don’t buy that because they were all drunk their stories would change.
Definitely think arrogance is showing here by accusing the Brazilian police of overreacting for doing their job.
I definitely think that something happened but it’s undeniable that it may not be according to Lochte’s accounting. As much flack as we give some celebrities for not acting their age, we are making a lot of excuses for this 30-plus year old man.
He’s an athlete. There isn’t a group of people in the world so ridiculously worshipped and protected as athletes.
What story? He only gave one interview when aught on the beach early in the morning by NBC-and zero statements since then. The only people who claim his story is changing are one judge:the cops and they haven’t even talked to him. That makes zero sense.
Meanwhile-while all this was going on a UK athlete was robbed at gunpoint last night. This is not going to end up well for the Brazilian cops if they keep playing it the way they are.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/aug/17/british-athlete-held-at-gunpoint-robbery-rio-olympics?CMP=edit_2221
But how is it that all the other robbed athletes had no problems reporting the crime and dealing with the police and these four turned their case into an international scandal?
Hasn’t this turned into an international scandal because Brazil wants their passports? That’s what makes this story so interesting…
I wasn’t even paying attention to the robbery story that much (maybe because I’m jaded about crime?) until I heard that the judge ordered that Lochte surrender his passport.
Lochte did give a statement to the police thought. And he has already given three different accounts of what happened: one to NBC (multiple muggers), one to the police (only one mugger) and one to Lauer, backpedaling on some of his claims (they were actually robbed at a gas station, not pulled out in the street). He’s changing significant details of the story. How drunk would he have to be to mistake being pulled out on the street to being mugged in a gas station?
@ perplexed
No. It became an international scandal when Lochte told the world that he might have been robbed by police. I can’t believe the backlash Brazil is getting for taking Lochte’s claim seriously and trying to find out if cops were actually responsible.
And why does Brazil want their passport? Again, why didn’t the other athletes have problems with them? Why were they willing to give statements and report the crimes and the US team is behaving as if war lords were hunting them down and not the Brazilian government wanting to question them?
@ Mich, yes! I can’t believe that people even on this site known for thoughtful commentators are aghast that the Brazilian authorities would want to investigate claims by one of the biggest stars of the OI from one of the most influential countries in the world that he was robbed at gun-point by the police!
I’ll be honest — I would be reluctant to hand over my passport. That thing I guard with my life. I don’t see how they’re even legally obligated to hand it over — the American Embassy should be handling this for them (maybe they are, I don’t know. But a passport is not something you easily surrender on your own).
I’m surprised at the assumption that anyone should just easily give up their passport.
@Leo: because it was a minor, commonplace crime. Getting your cash cleaned out happens all over the world. Getting scammed by a cab driver happens all over the world, and it’s not normally something that merits a police investigation of any sort, no matter where you are in the world. You get irritated, and then go on with your day. But by turning this into an international incident, NOW people think they were robbed by police.
@ Bridget LOCHTE said they might have been robbed by police. How can you understand the rest of the story if you don’t even get the beginning of it right?
@Mich: all of his statements were that someone flashed a badge, but had no other trappings of being a police officer.
@Bridget, not to be rude, but you are totally missing the point. Ryan Lochte went on air and told the entire world that he was robbed by the police. He himself involved the police. You are right, getting mugged by a cabbie or a pickpocket in a huge turist destination during the OI is to be expected. But Lochte didn’t stopped there. He accused the police.
I get your point, I just disagree with that reading. But it’s just semantics – even if the Brazilian police didn’t read it as accusatory toward them, this clearly hit a sensitive point.
Doing their job would’ve been asking Lochte and the others to stick around for a couple extra days in case they had some more questions or asking them if they wanted to file a police report or get their contact information so there could be further communication if necessary (which, according to Lochte he did give them further means to contact him and they never did. they went to a judge instead).
The Brazilian government escalated things fast. It went from informal questioning of these athletes and they were never told they couldn’t leave the country after the informal questioning to a judge executing an order that the passports of the victims to this robbery be seized and that these individuals be detained and not be allowed to leave the country until they submit to law enforcement questioning and a sworn statement. That’s a pretty big overreach IMO.
+1 My takeaway is if I’m robbed as a tourist in Brazil, I absolutely will not report the crime to authorities because by reporting it I could be detained for questioning and/or my passport would be confiscated.
The only suspicious thing is the strong arm tactics by the Brazillians. This isn’t about country pride. They want the Americans to say it never happened. All have said it did. They can’t identify the robbers and I don’t blame Lochte for leaving.
And for everyone saying this would happen in America. Not quite. You take a report and investigate. No yanking non-citizens off a plane for a mugging where everyone is alive and well. Folks got better things to do when no one is dead.
Considering the corruption of Brazilian authorities and the police they maybe over reacting with the swimmers to a) cover something up or b) to make an example of them to show the world that they are not corrupt.
The press have kept quiet about a lot of things that have been happening during the games and I expect it all to come out after the Paralympics when they are all safe and well at home.
Yes Brazilian authorities are acting insane. Even if Lochte, Bentz and Conger made up their story, making up a story about being robbed is not a crime so there is no legal justification for yanking Betz and Conger’s passports and holding them for an investigation.
My understanding is that it IS a crime in Brazil to falsely report a crime to authorities, but none of the 3 of them ever reported it to authorities.
People here bad mouthing the Brazilians authorities… Isn’t in the USA where the police kills black people? Isn’t in the USA where a good cop is a dead cop? Isn’t in the USA where cops are crooks? Isn’t in the USA where FBI is corrupted? People here saying Brazil is a violent country…. Isn’t in the USA where happens mass murdering all the time? Isn’t in the USA where rioting neighborhoods is okay? Isn’t in the USA where Organizations Groups block Highways making impossible to ambulances go through? Isn’t in the USA where people put fire on cars??? What about Chicago, California…. Oh the hypocrisy
It’s insane, isn’t it?
+100000000
Yes you are right. I just think it’s crazy they are pulling people off a plane about a mugging! It seems rather overly dramatic and unnecessary. There were several incidents of violence reported, why all this fuss over a simple mugging? People are held up every day. Rio police are making this blow up, they should have just let it go and it would disappear a lot quicker. Instead, they are drawing more attention to it.
Yes, Flavia, and we’re outraged by that too. One does not excuse the other.
Careful, your ignorance and anti-American bias is showing. The USA is comprised of 318.9 million people – yes, we have had instances of police brutality and mass murders and corruption. Every country has its issues, and we do as well.
But the fact of the matter is Rio is a disaster. Elite Olympians are getting robbed at an alarming rate, among other issues. Trying to point to American issues isn’t going to change that fact, sorry.
I don’t think anyone is saying that America is perfect. Its not. But arguing that Rio is safe is like saying the southside of Chicago is safe. Parts of it, maybe, but not all of it. The reality is, if these Olympics were in Chicago and this happened, athletes wouldn’t be pulled off of a disembarking aircraft for something so minor. THAT’S the real scandal to me. Someone getting mugged in Rio is like saying the sky is blue. No surprise, but the fact that the government is treating them like criminals over it is major news.
You be careful. United States is a disaster from left and right. I am not anti-american… I do not recall myself burning an american flag and being invited to go to CNN to pose as a hero. Anyway…. True hurts hum?
According to anon small crimes should not be investigated..hmmmm . Maybe we should go to a department store and shoplift a 1,99$ product? Hmmmm. Yes, just a minor crime. Who cares, right? I can also can say wherever I want without any consequenses, with sure the police will let it go… Wow
@Flavia the truth doesn’t hurt, but ignorance makes you look silly. Have you been to the United States? Like Brazil, many places are perfectly safe. That doesn’t mean that all of them are. It’s like that anywhere, including Brazil. But your point makes no sense, the swimmers DIDN’T steal anything. They committed no crime. So why are they being treated like criminals? THEY were the alleged victims. I’m not saying crime should be ignored, it SHOULD be investigated. But the country is more concerned with alleged false reports than they are over actual crimes, how does that help?
I’d like to know when the last time a SUSPECT was pulled off of a disembarking aircraft and held against their will was in Brazil. It doesn’t happen. They are targeting victims of a crime to get them to admit it never happened.
@Flavia From your comebacks and false parallels, I see you lack basic logic. No use in arguing then. Cheers!
Anon. Yes. Im silly and you are too smart. And BTW i live in NY. Have a great day
Missy. Go back to the gossip news and stay out of politics. Cheers!!
@Flavia, May I ask why you are living in the US and not your native country? Genuinely curious. And if one of us should stay out of politics, it should not be me.
Flavia, if you hate the US so much, why do you live here? Your ignorance of America is quite entertaining, really.
There are over 318 million people in the US and there were around 15,000 homocides last year. Brazil has 212 million people and around 58,000 homocides last year. So while there are legitimate concerns about the state of the US, I think it is pretty disingenuous to disregard Brazil’s troubles. You probably feel exactly how many Americans feel when their country is bad mouthed.
Hey Elise. Im not disregarding Brazil’s trouble. And I go further…brazil is a sewer. Im just amazed about people comments in this topic, while USA is not the safest place to travel either. And yes…. brazil is a very violent country. But it took sevaral decades to the country gets where it is right now. Pehaps USA is striding faster and it will be just like Brazil soon, but the difference is, it will take less time. Good lucky to you.
Thank you, Elise.
And yes, people will comment on Brazilian crime when their countries’ athletes are victims, and when the world spotlight is shining down on Rio. It’s one of the most newsworthy stories at the moment. And when the Olympics are over, and when (God forbid) there’s another instance of American police brutality, we will talk about that, too. I don’t think there’s anything hypocritical about that at all.
You are missing the point Flavia. This is not about comparing per capita crime rates in the USA vs. Brazil or any other country for that matter.
But your comment got me curious so I looked it up. The rate of robbery in Brazil is more than 4X greater than the USA according to the United Nations. Brazil robberies was 495.7 per 100,000 people and 108 in the USA. That was for 2014.
https://data.unodc.org/sys/rpt?reportfile=crime-statistics-robbery®ION=__ALL®ION__label=All&SUBREGION=__ALL&SUBREGION__label=All&COUNTRY=__ALL&COUNTRY__label=All+%28139%29&format=html&fullscreen=true&showtoc=true#state:0
We are not perfect either. And there are places that I would tell a tourist to avoid for fear of crime.
They can’t be charged for filing a false police report when they never filed one. The told the story to one media person and then after it got attention THEN the cops started looking into it.
I think they got robbed prob while going out to get drugs/hookers. And were so drunk that the details are fuzzy. Blowing this up into a international incident is lose lose for everyone.
The problem is that Rio has become an easy target. If you go out and you accidentally get drunk off your ass or do some other embarrassing thing, it’s pretty easy to blame Rio for it because it already has a reputation.
Maybe the authorities are abusive or maybe Lochte and co. met some hookers that stole their money and now they are trying to get away clean by blaming a city that is already under fire. Lochte does not seem very vocal about the abuse of Rio authorities, neither do the US officials for that matter.
IF they are hiding something, it would be fun to find out.
It could be that they tried to pick up a couple of transgender hookers, of which Rio is famous for. Many of them are very attractive women. The mugging story could be a cover for discovering the real gender after parting with money.
Let’s not forget that they did not report any of it.
Lochte’s mom insisted that it happened. Which could be very funny if this scenario is true, I can’t imagine he told his mom, the poor woman got in the middle of something weird.
If that’s the case, I’d far rather see it go away than see transphobic headlines in papers across the world.
Confiscating passports and yanking people off of planes to “interview” them about a crime they didn’t even report to the authorities is insane. For sure.
I bet Lochte is glad he got the hell out of dodge. Hopefully the other 3 can leave before this gets any weirder.
Like the police don’t have anything better to do than pull Olympic athletes off a plane to talk to them about a crime they didn’t even report to authorities?! Brazil is really overstepping trying to save face. So they (and other athletes) got mugged. It’s a big deal but not the end of the world. Muggings happen in big cities all over the world.
That’s the part that struck me. They never filed a police report. Where does a judge get off ordering passports confiscated, and what justification did the police use for pulling these guys off a plane? If they made up the story, that’s contemptible, but confiscating passports? Yikes.
This is crazy. I tend to believe that they may have been less than truthful about HOW they were robbed, but its pretty obvious that they were in fact robbed. THAT should be the point. Brazil is clearly targeting them since this got so much publicity. Many other athletes from other countries, including Great Britain, have been robbed and now the Great Britain olympic committee is advising athletes NOT TO LEAVE THE VILLAGE. If the Brazilian judicial system put half as much effort into reducing violent crime as they do pulling people off planes over someone else’s “false police report” they’d be a lot better off.
Yes, it makes sense that Lochte was so upset he called his mother first. I believe it. That was probably his mistake if they were looking for strange and got robbed while enmeshed in a salacious situation. He’d want to cover it up later, but Mom has already told the media. The whole story makes Brazil look really bad. The government is blowing this up. How in the world can they detain American citizens going home on a plane flight? Outrageous.
I’m actually not sure what’s going on exactly- but I think a big issue right now is that the video of them returning to the Olympic Village is out and they look very normal and (from far) they seem to have wallets and phones and their Olympic badges etc. So it seems a bit sketchy. Also the two athletes detained do have one of the best lawyers (in Brazil?) sitting in with them (I read that on ABC this morning 😉 So hopefully they can give their statements and get out. I can’t judge from the video- cause different people look different ways drunk and I don’t want to judge BUT I am curious as to what you guys will make of the video….
I thought Lochte looked drunk, but I dont know if thats his normal attitude(?) I saw him in that carpool karaoke thing they did and he looked like he was in lalaland so I really dont know.
One of them was really red, could be he was drunk or was running(?)
The other 2 looked normal to me, but again I dont know. Maybe they were still in shock and didnt know how to act.
Even if the details are inconsistent from the swimmers, I don’t find that strange necessarily. If I was held at gunpoint, I’m not sure my memory would recall everything to perfection. Isn’t this what happens to people under cross-examination — some of the details become a little mixed-up in memory because of the trauma endured? It’s not a regular situation you’re trying to recall…
It happend to me in Paris. A friend and i were robbed in the metro. Not even two hours later we told the police… And things got crazy.
I remember there was a gang of 3 women with knives. The “alpha female” had brown hair and wore a blue shirt and jeans.
My friend told the police that there were 4 or 5 women and that the main women had very dark hair and wore all black.
It’s now 5 years later and we still fight about who’s right… Seriously all i see are 3 faceless women with knives. Over time i even doubted my own story.
Yeah I’ve heard it’s very common for eyewitness accounts to vary. For me, it is very hard to remember faces.
well considering that there are still thousands of athletes in rio, it doesn’t seem that terrible that the police take this seriously and are doing an inquiry
I wonder how many people here who seem to think they know so much about Rio and Brazil and the corruption etc. have ever even stepped foot in the place.
Lochte told the world that they were possibly mugged by police and a whole lot of people here at CB seem happy to take him at his word while at the same time saying that the police taking Lochte’s claim seriously proves that they are corrupt.
I don’t think anyone thought they were mugged by police officers until a couple of swimmers were yanked off of planes with their passports taken.
hahaha THIS!
Ryan Lochte himself said in an interview they were robbed by a person with a police badge, posing as a Brazilian police officer. That’s were people got it from.
Posing being the important word. Most folks understand that “posing as a police officer” isn’t the same as “being a police officer”.
I think authorities in all countries are corrupt. I have yet to hear of ANY country that is a utopia when it comes to lack of corruption. Even if this happened in the USA, I would be less inclined to believe authorities, given what you see on the news of institutions going to great lengths to protect themselves.
When it comes to someone reporting a crime, I’m always more likely to believe the victim. It’s highly unusual for anyone to lie about being robbed, beaten, or raped, so I generally believe the person who went through the trauma.
I lived in Brazil for a year from 2013-2014 and worked with the government. It was corrupt. Period, full stop. The police were actually the sketchiest part. I am not someone who thinks America is perfect, our judicial system certainly isn’t. But that doesn’t change the fact that the policy, particularly in Rio, were sketchy as hell. Also, I wasn’t with an American security team, I was with a Brazilian one and the son of a former President of Brazil was the one who cautioned me the most. I’m also from Detroit, so I’m all too familiar with sketchy areas.
I’m going to have the following scattered Thoughts:
* Ya’ll can’t have it both ways, for all the vaguely condescending Tut-Tutting about the safety in Brazil and third worldliness you want them to Investigate or Nah?? LOL Investigate they did!
*Must be nice to be believed at face value like that, ya Know get attention, people capping for you and also the authorities chop-chopping on the case… mmmmm
* Also LOL cause this being the place it is ( and I’m sorry but around my TL for example is all the dudes yuck yucking it up as a sex tourism capital) THE ONLY THING I THOUGHT WAS “Pussy Run Gone Bad…Or Really Really good.. it depends” but kept my mouth shut cause everyone is being so preciously Jingoistic about it on both sides LOLOLOLOOLO
* Either way probably Drunk/sex/druggie fun post games pretty harmless and expected ( so long as everyone uses condoms and is consenting I frankly dGAF) , should not have lied about it but did because now we have an International Imbroglio and people are gonna want apologies for having their names dragged through the mud on all the sides
Sums it up perfectly
ha, I thought the same QQ! Lochte et al have shiny sponsorships and images to protect.
I stand by this – no mugger would leave behind mobile phones.
Spot on!!
I thought the same thing, QQ. But Lochte was so adamant in his story that I believed him. So disappointing… Jeah!
Are these swimmers the ONLY athletes who claim to be crime victims? If not ,have the Brazilian officials investigated and /or detained the other “alleged victims”?
They are the only ones who said the ones who robbed them at gun point were police officers.
Next time I’m in the US ang get mugged I will say they were police officers, and see how lightly I’m treated.
He didn’t say they were police officers.He said they were posing as officers.Two different things.
It’s a mute point because in this case the swimmers were lying but I still the police they overreacted. If you said some men posing as officers robbed you I guarantee you wouldn’t be detained.
No they said posed as police officers and flashed a badge. Pretended to be cops, not actual cops.
Honestly, they would probably barely listen to you. Police officers in big cities tend to be overworked, and small scale crimes like that get a report and then that’s pretty much it. Which was actually why I found the Brazilian Police reaction weird.
This whole thing is weird, but as far as the inconsistencies go, it is not unusual for people to remember different things when a crime is committed. My father was in a gas station that was robbed. No one was hurt, thank goodness, but when the police came to take statements, my father gave them a description of the gun that was so specific, he even suggested the type of ammo that was likely in it, even though a shot hadn’t been fired. They asked for a description of the guy, and my dad had no clue beyond height and hair color. Meanwhile, another guy in there gave a detailed description of the guy, but said the guy had a knife instead of a gun.
The guy was caught within a few hours, and my father was dead on about the gun, and the other guy was dead on about the description. None of them were even drunk, which gives an extra layer of confusion.
This thing would have most likely died out if the Rio LEOs (see what I did there?) hadn’t started demanding passports and such. I heard about it after it got reported and thought about how scary that must have been, but then went on and happily continued to watch the Olympics, because crime happens EVERYWHERE, especially in big cities, and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if a bunch of young guys were doing something stupid in a part of town that wasn’t safe. It didn’t even get my attention again until the Rio police started demanding passports and yanking people off planes.
I am totally fascinated with this story, because I think it’s connected to the bigger issue of corruption within the IOC and how any entity that willingly does business with them any more is either corrupt or extremely comfortable with dealing with corruption.
Since this is clearly a sensitive topic I should clarify – I’m not trying to imply that all of Brazil is corrupt, rather that there’s a 3rd entity at play that is notoriously corrupt, the IOC.
Just got a breaking news alert that the story was fabricated and there is video that shows the swimmers fighting with security forces at the gas station.
my actual noise just now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ov8mAjlDhd8
Just for clarification – that would be the gas station where the person on duty denied ever seeing them at all that night, right?
Well this has surely been a calm and respectful discussion. Holy sh*t.
Look, it’s easier to tell a story that everyone knew it was going to happen, right? It amazes me the blind defense of someone who might be lying about a crime and a country, making it look bad in order to save some face.
You go to the media and tell a story that essentially shows the police are not doing its job properly. The police then goes and tries to show they can do their job, asking for depositions. They were all questioned as witnesses.
The depositions are inconsistent, the video surfaces, and things just don’t add up. So the police summoned the swimmers again, to double check. The local law states that you can’t leave the country until all your queries with the Justice are resolved – that’s why the passports are confiscated. Whether the swimmers did or did not want to be involved with the Justice or drag this subject further, the fact is they reported a crime and now are involved with all the bureaucracy that comes along.
That’s not a great trait of Brazil – things tend to be extremely bureaucratic and slow and crooked. But it’s the way it works, so there’s nothing we can do right now to make it easier.
But then you find out that one swimmer is already in the US, changing the story once again, and two other are leaving, already in the plane, even though they were informed further questioning was due.
Sorry. That sounds sketchy to me. They should’ve stayed like the fourth swimmer, who by the way is nowhere to be found.
They were robbed? Most likely. No one is denying that. But the facts so far don’t add up, and they are not helping at all by not obliging to the Justice. You can’t expect Brazil to be okay with one of the most recognized swimmers in the world saying sh-t about the country, when that might not even be true.
Also, a little piece of information about bureaucracy and passports and the US (not that has anything to do with it, but I’m still shocked with so many prejudiced views of Brazil in this discussion)
You know all the screening Trump wants to do to allow immigrants? Yeah, ridiculous, right? To some extent, that already happens with tourists from some countries – Brazil included.
To travel to the US, we must present ourselves to the American Embassy, so authorities can question us on virtually everything about our lives – from tax returns to if I ever met someone who lived in America – so they can decide if we just want to enjoy some days at Disney or we’re plotting to stay forever in the US because obviously immigrants can’t be good news.
It’s humiliating. However, it’s the law from the country we’d like to visit, so we oblige.
IMO, Americans should oblige to Brazilian laws too when in Brazil, as far-fetched as it may sound.
You know Brazil does the exact same thing do Americans who want to visit Brazil, right?
Re: passports and visas: the US has a policy of reciprocity. For example, getting a Visa to visit Brazil actually requires significant documentation (including financial/employer) and needs to be presented in person, though you can hire a service to do that.
We can’t hire someone to do that for us. And reciprocity is the name of the game. You do that, we do that.
Hiring someone *may* just be a function of work/business visas, it’s been a while since I’ve looked it up (it’s a really specialized service)
Lochte said they were robbed at gunpoint by POLICE OFFICERS. He involved the police even if he didn’t file a report and only called his mother, and then she decided to make it public. Lochte went on air to repeat he was mugged by police officers.
Why is the implications of his statements so hard to understand? Of course the Brazilian authorities are going to dig deep, as they should! Especially if their stories don’t add up, there’s video showing they lied about the timeline.
If I were brazilian I would be so pissed at the amout of disrespect shown.
“If I were brazilian I would be so pissed at the amout of disrespect shown.”
Yup.
just for the record, he said they were robbed by people wearing police uniforms. Whether they were or weren’t, he never stated that he was robbed by the police. But in any case, mistakes were made by both sides in handling this entire thing. I tend to believe they were robbed. I don’t necessarily know/believe all the circumstances behind it.
@Cee: I watched the interview with Ryan Lochte Sunday night… apparently very few people commenting on this article did. What he said is that they wore police uniforms, flashed a badge and pointed a gun. He never once said he was robbed at gunpoint by police officers or even hinted at that he thought they were police officers.
The video only shows that they mixed up the time when they left the hospitality house, not they lied. They were drunk, do you remember everything after drinking?
I wonder what the Brazilian law are for libel/defamation ?
I know that in the USA, one can say almost any and everything under what is consider there Freedom of speech.
In France, what is considered one’s Freedom of speech is limited by the others right not to be defamed. The charge of proof is also victim friendlier.
If (please, note I said IF) Lochte lied to his mama, then choose to publicly embarrass Rio and it’s police (damaging Brazil reputation and it’s tourism expectations) rather than admit to, let’s say losing all his money in a brothel, then, depending of the laws there, it could (Once again I said COULD) be considered a crime.
The others muggings did not make the big news here, I only heard about Lochte ‘s. Because he is a celebrity and because he implied that the perpetrators were police officers.
I find it amazing that some people defend a city known for crime and problems on the ground that other countrys have high crime and problems, too.
Does it makes the crime and problems in the City less real?
I believe the swimmers until something comes out otherwise. They already said they were scared to tell people because they were out of the Olympic village and drinking…they thought they would get in trouble. But since they are of age and their are no rules about leaving the Olympic village, they are fine. I bet they were robbed. And hello Alcohol is giving them inconsistent stories. If it was dark out, I was in Rio or another foreign place and someone pulled a gun on me…I probably wouldn’t remember every detail either.
A video just shown up… it shows the swimmers, drunk as hell, making a mess on a gas station. They broke several things inside a bathroom and it wasnt robbers that stopped them. It was the security from the gas station wanting to know what hell was happening..
Idiots
And yes.. they took money from them.. but it wasnt a robbery.. it was to pay the damage that they cause…
Sigh. Dumbasses.
No video has been released. It’s being reported, with unofficial people describing events. I’ll wait for the video, thanks. Especially after this same gas station attendant yesterday said he never saw the swimmers and had no video of them.
Just go to the TMZ site, they have the video up there!
That video does not show that they damaged anything. All it shows was them getting in their taxi, then getting told to get out and get on the ground with their hands up.
I’m supposed to believe the gas station attendant who previously said he had never seen them? From this video, it does just look like they got mugged.
So they trashed a gas station, security took their names and then they concocted a story about how they were robbed of their IDs in order to try to blame said robbers for what they did? And then known genius Lochte turned it up to 11? If true, lol!
Lochte and co. should apologize to Brazillians for making their country look like a hell hole. Brazilians have enough problems as it is, they don’t need dumb Americans who can’t handle their liquor lying about what actually happened. This is a highly publicized case and I’m sure many Brazilians are mad as hell.
So…. is no one going to update this post with the footage from the gas station (where they said they were robbed), that shows all 4 swimmers arriving in a cab, happy and drunk, peeing everywhere, destroying property and getting into an argument with security? Cause that’s not what police is saying it happened, it’s what ACTUAL video shows.
Lol Arabella I keep refreshing the page, waiting for the update myself! Lochte et al played me for a fool, that’s for sure.
Hey, that’s my name! 🙂
The funniest thing is that the international community seems to be outraged over this, and also think that Brazilians are outraged. Meanwhile, we’re creating memes on twitter and waiting for Bentz and Conger to throw Lochte under the bus like it’s another Olympic final. These four are not the first athletes to have a crazy night in Rio and try to blame it on a fake robbery.
i just posted that on the last Ryan Lochte story!!!!
as my sister told me: there’s a reason why Brazil are the only ones asking US residents for visas.
Yeah they treat them, just like the rest of the world treat southamericans.
Brazil requires visas because the US requires visas of Brazilians.
The US requires visas from many countries, but not all of them can do the same to them, because we can’t afford it.
Good for Brazil.
Uh, okay?
Arabella, the gas station video is not necessarily the entire story. It’s way too early to declare who is or isn’t guilty of anything. At least that is how it works in the US justice system. A person is supposed to be considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
The people who had been accused of wrongdoing here were the Brazilian authorities.
Sketchy as hell
Glad the truth is out
You’d be surprised to know that “innocent until proven guilty” actually exists in many countries outside the US. The swimmers haven’t been charged with anything yet, and as famous people, they probably won’t be (something that also exists is a lot of countries). However, they did break property and lied creating a huge mess.
The reason more attention has been given to this was that the other robberies were real and most likely the police tried but couldn’t find the robber (most of these happen extremely quickly in the middle of crowded streets and away from cameras). There was nothing sketchy about their reports. This story, however, was super sketchy from the start. I understand why someone who’s not Brazilian wouldn’t see it, but ANY Brazilian person, especially police, who listened to his story would immediately go “wait, WHATt?”.
The only video I have seen is on Deadspin and it shows them sitting down on steps for about 2 minutes. If there is a video that shows the peeing and throwing stones then I haven’t seen it yet.
And what I find odd is that at first they were claiming that a door was damaged and now the story is them peeing all over. The story about the damaged door was told to BBC news by someone from Brazilian authorities. Now the story is changed yet again.
Do I think Lochte and friends were drunk assholes ? Sure. But this investigation is chaos.
I read that a reporter translated the story on Twitter from a Brazilian publication, but nothing that conclusively proves that either side (the swimmers or the police) is lying. Perez Hilton said that the swimmers said that Ryan Lochte kicked in a bathroom door, but again that comes from Brazilian sources. We don’t know yet if the swimmers have confirmed the Brazilian police’s version of the story to US media. Even the videos that have been talked about so far only show Lochte and his teammates walking around. I don’t see any confrontations as yet happening on any of them.
Yes, you should look at what the video ACTUALLY shows. (Note: there is no audio) It shows one of the swimmers moving through a doorway at the gas station. Next, it shows all four coming out and getting into a taxi. The taxi driver then gets in. Next, a man in a black uniform holding a GUN IN HIS HAND approaches the taxi and sticks the gun in through the rear window where 3 of the swimmers are sitting. He stops pointing the gun at them and puts his arm at his side where you can still see the gun, and he walks away from the taxi and out of sight of the camera. Next, the taxi next to the one the swimmers are in, pulls out and there is a blip in the footage. If you look at the time stamp, you will notice it jumps ahead 3 minutes, so that is 3 minutes of video that has been cut out!?! Why? It would be nice to know. Next you see the swimmers exit the car and head towards the area where the uniform with the gun supposedly is. A couple of them show their hands (that they are empty) and the last one holds both hands up, then puts them down, then holds them up again as he approaches uniform with gun. Then, the video switches to another camera and you see 3 of them with their hands up and then they sit on the ground. That’s it for video. If you scroll down there’s a picture that shows the bathroom that the swimmers allegedly trashed. It looks like a typical old grungy gas station bathroom. The door doesn’t look broken, but it looks like it may have shoe marks on it, like it had been kicked?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3747442/The-truth-told-drunk-Video-shows-Lyin-Ryan-swimmers-destroying-gas-station-bathroom-Brazilian-police-furiously-deny-robbery-claims-brazen-Lochte-laughs-social-media.html#video
The truth is, we will not know what really happened until these other guys get home and tell their story, if they even do. We obviously can’t trust the dullard Lochte’s version, and the 3 that are currently trapped there are undoubtedly going to say whatever it takes to get the hell out of there. Maybe they felt that they didn’t damage the bathroom and that they were being extorted for their $ by an officer with a gun. Cops stop you for nothing and will let you go with a cash payment all the time in Mexico, Central and South American countries.
So, who knows? I just hope they are released quickly and return home safely, along with all of the other Olympians. But I wouldn’t be too quick to believe the sensational headlines about this case.
+1
Seems like IOC and Brazil have something big to lose and are trying to discredit the account. This reeks of corruption.
The swimmers had nothing to gain from reporting it.
Ryan Lochte: World Class Swimmer and still a World Class Dum Dum. Why, in a world where are there cameras everywhere, would they even attempt lying about this? So wildly arrogant and ridiculous. 3 dumb children and a silly man child, what a farce.
I guess we know what the IOC was really trying to cover up initially… his lying ass.
“I guess we know what the IOC was really trying to cover up initially… his lying ass.”
Lol! Indeed.
And I guess we know now why they never reported it to the police.
And he lied to his mother!
His mother (who is a character in her own right) is the one who ran to the press in the first place. And if I’m honest, just after watching a few of her cringeworthy interviews, it should not have been a surprise.
Her sun rises and sets on him. It’s pretty funny, just not in this case.
ecurity camera footage from the gas station shows the swimmers walking through a hallway back toward the bathroom, and then leave. You can’t see what happens by the bathroom door.
Once they get in their taxi though, gas station employees approach and after some discussion they all get out of the cab. At the very end of the video footage … the swimmers have their hands up and it appears they’re being forced to sit on the ground.
There’s no gun visible in the video.
Thats the TMZ video description. Just saw it and agree they look drunk but all you see is them is leaving bathroom hallway, not trashing anything, they stumble back to and confuse their taxi, get in and at the end it seems some of them remove money from their wallets and they sit on the curb on the ground.
Who knows what happened? One thing should be clear though whenever you travel you don’t have the same rights you have at home. So be aware of your actions because either they can be misconstrued or if anything did happen and you were either involved or at fault you might not get off easily. Some countries have crazy laws that involve prison time for littering, PDA, etc…
I don’t see anything being trashed either. Where are the videos of them trashing stuff?
There is a gun visible in the Daily Mail video. I posted about it upthread and linked to it. You are correct though that the video does not show them trashing the bathroom as all the media outlets are reporting. I am using a large high def screen and can see the gun clearly. The man holding it is wearing a black uniform and I read he was an off duty cop.
I still can’t see a gun. I can see him point and reach through the window, but I can’t see a gun.
They have made up a whole load of shit because they are stupid, young kids who think they are invincible! I’ve lived in Rio, I’ve been held up at gunpoint – yes it does happen, a lot, but the whole story from the start didn’t sit right with me – they described an American hold up (been watching too much TV) – telling someone to get on the ground isn’t something a Brasilian robber would do. If they had resisted, as he described he would have been dead by now. They were up to no good, lied about it and made up a whole load of cock and bull. I don’t blame the Brasilian authorities wanting to get to the bottom of their lies, they are discrediting their host country.
Lochte is over 32 — I think but am too lazy to look it up. He’s not a kid. This was foolish on their part to concoct this story. Just don’t understand how this guy always get a pass because he’s just a dumb, innocent, harmless dude.
Not sure why Ryan told his mom anything but why did she ran to the press?
Don’t think that Ryan will be invited to participate in the 2020 Olympics. He should’ve been like Phelps, who is happily back in Arizona with his family.
Whatever the truth is, my guess is his momma believed her baby and was -very publicly – outraged on his behalf.
No one has mentioned the language barrier.
4 drunk English speakers ‘interacted’ with Portuguese speakers who may or may not have thought the swimmers broke a door and may or may not have robbed the swimmers.
I agree, with the language difference and their dunk, dumb state….they probably thought they DID get robbed! Hahahahah Wow. What a sh–t show.
Sorry, can’t think clearly while this hook is in my mouth. I bought their story and am embarrassed at my naïveté. Lochte is even dumber than I thought. Almost as dumb as me for believing him.
Nah, like I said, it didn’t look weird for anybody who isn’t Brazilian. Your perspective on this is “Brazil is a dangerous country and people are often robbed at gun point, why would a famous athlete lie?”, while ours was “yes, these things do happen and when they do, they happen in this very specific way. No one who has ever been robbed here has experienced in this way. It sounds like an American movie robbery, not an actual Brazilian street one. And plenty of people have partied way too hard before and tried to use a fake robbery as a scapegoat (including our own soccer players)”. So I get it.
As a brazilian, sure you get it. But people here were ready to jump to conclusions when they were still investigating.
As much as i believed Lochte, i also had the idea, that maybe there’s something else, because why then, the authorities would be making such a big deal? They weren’t letting this one go, now we know why.
All of us in south America get it.
You get mugged in Buenos Aires? They take you iPhone rather than your cash, and they definitely have no need to use guns as most people comply.
Estoy feliz de que la verdad haya salido a la luz. En este país estamos todos enojados por el trato que recibieron.
Yes we do, but still americans are going to explain this for us, amirite?
Saludos!
Thanks, Cee! My (Canadian) husband was in line at the groceries yesterday and told me there was a family complaining about how Brazilians are not educated enough to watch Olympics games. Having lived here, he was very much upset at them. It’s insane how people easily turn to “our way is the PROPER way to cheer! their sports-watching culture is wrong! they should modify it for two weeks to appease us!” when their romantic ideas about an “exotic” country doesn’t match reality.
Let’s hope those who thought we were too loud never attend a Brazil vs Argentina soccer game! 🙂
Can we agree that this is the weirdest Olympic scandal ever?
-4 drunk American swimmers misbehave at a gas station in the middle of the night on their way home
-security demands they pat restitution, but because none of these guys speak Portuguese they think they’re being robbed
-the most famous of the 4 tells his mom, who then tells the world press, who then behave as though having your cash lifted off you in a foreign country is the biggest deal ever
-Brazil Police or the judge are offended as they think Lochte ‘ description of the security guard means that he’s telling the world he was robbed by cops
-Brazil judge, trying to clear their reputation, demands passports and that they stay, but turning it into a full blown international incident
I think the reporting of the scandal is strange too. Most of the story is coming from “sources” but not from the other two swimmers themselves (although maybe they’re on a plane right now and we’ll hear from them once they’re in the USA).
I think you hit the nail. Language barrier. Its gonna be so funny if it turned out it was a huge misunderstanding, right out of a sitcom.
I mean, it doesn’t change the fact that they damaged someone’s property, and I hope they pay and apologize. But some of the details match up – there was a gun, the guys had to get out of the car – it’s just that it was the security guard, trying to deal with drunks, not an actual criminal.
I sincerely do not understand why Ryan Lochte opened his mouth in the first place. Literally all he had to do was not say anything, if presumably the cash they gave the gas station was sufficient.
Well, his mom was the one who opened her mouth and started this s**tstorm. But he definately didnt manage this properly.
And I feel bad for the other swimmers, I know Id be resentful towards Lotche, he did tell his mom who then proceeded to tell the press, than he gets away freely and they are stuck back in Brazil dealing with his f**k up.
I have to admit, when I heard these guys were being detained just because they didn’t accurately remember all the details of being robbed, I thought the Brazilian authorities were overreacting like crazy. I mean, who remembers things perfectly? But now that it turns out it really was a bizarre coverup of a legit crime, I’ve got egg on my face. Now I have to live with the shame of being tricked by Ryan Lochte. It boggles my mind that they would lie about this. If they’d just not said anything and gone home, they would have probably been fine. I would buy the interpretation that they were so drunk and unable to communicate across the language barrier that they thought they were robbed, if it weren’t for the fact that one of them denied it to the IOC right off the bat. The whole thing is just bizarre.
I haven’t seen much of it here, but I’m so tired of seeing people in the news make excuses for these “boys.” Isn’t it funny how jocks and sportsman automatically get relegated to the almost excusable category of “boys” as if they didn’t have the maturity in years to know the consequences of their actions? As a result, they are given a free pass. Ryan is 32. Yes, THIRTY-TWO years old….hardly a child by any stretch of the imagination.
And yet so many of the same people making excuses for these fools are armed and ready to classify some 11, 12, and 13 year olds as ADULTS because it meets their own biased, political agenda. Why does Lochte get a pass? I guess being cute and winsome trumps all sense of just treatment. Seems like our efforts as a society would be better focused on encouraging children to have plastic surgery as well as achieve physical perfection if this is the nonsensical world that we are going to foist upon them. Let’s not even try to make things more ideal. Nope, let’s just save them the time and rewind civilization to its baseline grunts and primal instincts.
Okay, who had the footage showing everything?? No video shows them damaging property. Maybe the gas station security just thought “drunk Americans, easy target” and pocketed some fast cash. How much money was taken/given?? What a massive weird incident. It has taken over Olympic coverage! Imsane.
This article says that one of the swimmers is standing by his account:
http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/ryan-lochtes-teammate-jimmy-feigen-we-didnt-lie-about-rio-robbery-w435191
It’s the word of the Brazilian authorities against the word of the US swimmers, until the full video is released, I suppose.
Off to a patient visit. But if it turns out that the swimmers are all lying, I will gladly admit that “yes I was wrong.” The longer the story goes on, the more it seems that they might actually be lying. The thing I don’t understand, why? Why lie when the incident was over? And why did the gas station attendant say he didn’t see them? Or did they try to pay him off? Nothing points towards there being a reason in the world to concoct a story. And I didn’t think Lochte was bright enough to make up a story. Let’s see how this plays out.
If they’re lying, one of them will crack and tell the truth.
It strikes me that demanding badly behaving tourists give you money at gunpoint is probably not the official way people are supposed to handle vandalism and property damage. Maybe the attendant initially said he didn’t see them because he was afraid he’d get accused of being or colluding with a mugger? Just speculation.
AP says that Brazilian authorities have admitted two security guards did point guns at the swimmers. Which is obvious, since you can see one of them in the video, and you see the swimmers with their hands up twice.
http://www.sportingnews.com/athletics/news/ryan-lochte-video-jimmy-feigen-gunnar-bentz-jack-conger-rio-olympics-2016-gas-station/hl45llaimfbj11t1onto8vh0u
Hi All, long time reader here but first time poster. I just have to say, I’m shocked at how the general media is covering the story using Brazilian police statements as headlines, as if they’re completely true. I’m not saying they’re not and no offense to any Brazilians but at least for now there are two sides to this story. And from the video they’ve shown so far, the evidence seems to support the athletes’ view of things. Is there more video that hasn’t yet been shown? Maybe it was a miscommunication, where the police thought they were getting payment for damages and the athletes thought they were getting mugged? I just know I lived for a time in a country under martial law, and was later shocked to see how long it had taken US journalists to move beyond official sources and get opposing views. And btw — this isn’t just a Brazilian issue it’s a power issue, as cameras on US police cars have shown… Anyway, I love this site and the intelligence and support you all show each other. Here’s hoping this all gets resolved safely and sanely…
Everybody’s version of this story, including that of ABC news, keeps changing so fast:
http://www.tmz.com/2016/08/18/ryan-lochte-james-feigen/
The clearest lesson here is keep your parents off social media, and in the dark.