US swimmer Lochte’s legal troubles mount in Brazil

Rio de Janeiro Police Chief Fernando Veloso has said the USA athletes were not actually robbed, but were detained after vandalizing a bathroom at a gas station.

That and filing a false robbery report isn’t an extraditable offense, meaning that Lochte can’t be forced to go to Brazil for it.

The gold medal victor will be informed of the offence of “falsely reporting a crime” in the U.S. so he can decide how to mount his defence, according to a police statement, who have also recommended the International Olympic Committee’s ethics commission receive the document.

The police statement said they had recommended that the courts issue a summons for the 32-year-old gold medal-winner to be questioned.

Lochte, who said he “had too much to drink” that night, maintained that he and the other athletes were frightened because a gun was involved.

But police accuse the swimmers of fabricating the story, claiming the swimmers were in fact confronted by security guards after they vandalized a gas station. The gold medal victor will be informed of the charge against him and he will need to decide on whether to obtain legal representation in Brazil.

Top sponsors such as Speedo and Ralph Lauren this week abandoned Lochte. “I’m human. I made a mistake and I definitely learned from this”, Lochte said in an interview.

Reports emerged earlier on Thursday that Lochte was being summoned by Rio police. However, if Lochte does not appear at the hearing, the criminal case will continue without his testimony, Braune said.

Brazil had deployed 85,000 police and soldiers to secure the Games.

Brazilian police said Lochte’s story was a fabrication and that the Olympians – Lochte, Gunnar Bentz, Jack Conger and James Feigen – were not robbed and were not victims.

On Thursday Lochte did pick up one new sponsor account in Pine Bros.

Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Harrison and Green Bay Packers defensive players Clay Matthews and Julius Peppers met this week with National Football League investigators looking into allegations linking them to performance-enhancing drugs, the players’ union said. Once the state prosecutors have seen the indictment, they pass it on to a federal law enforcement agency, and that agency is responsible for notifying Lochte (although I sort of suspect he may have caught wind of it before then).