Swimwear brand Speedo decided to drop its sponsorship of U.S. swimmer Ryan Lochte after the scandal surrounding his robbery claim in Rio came to light. The company said that it can’t condone behavior that contradicts its values.

Last week, Lochte and three teammates claimed they were robbed at gunpoint at a gas station after a night out in Rio. But when police followed up with the swimmers, their statements differed from each other and Lochte’s nonchalant reaction to being threatened with a gun to his head, to which he responded by saying, “whatever,” also called his account into question.

By Thursday, it became clear that their reports of a robbery were embellished and possibly fictitious. Rio police said Lochte and friends had vandalized the gas station by tearing off the bathroom door and urinating on a wall. They then got out of the situation by paying the gas station owner for the damage. While questions about the Rio police’s handling of the incident came to light after USA Today reconstructed the events, it is clear that significant aspects of the original robbery story were fabricated.

On Friday, Lochte released a statement with an apology, saying he regretted not being more careful and candid in his description of the events. But for people in Rio, the damage to their city’s image is not yet fixed.

Speedo tweeted its formal statement on Monday:

The official response regarding our sponsorship of Ryan Lochte. pic.twitter.com/0DdP2RyceD

— Speedo USA (@SpeedoUSA) August 22, 2016

Other brands that have sponsorship deals with Lochte include Ralph Lauren and Japanese mattress company Airweave. Ralph Lauren said that it will not be renewing its contract with Lochte while Airweave told Bloomberg that it intends to maintain its partnership with the swimmer.

The spokesperson of the International Olympic Committee, Mario Andrada, made headlines when he defended the swimmers’ behavior on Thursday saying, “Let’s give these kids a break. Sometimes you take actions that you later regret. They are magnificent athletes.”

Considering Lochte is 32, that defense seems out of place, especially after social media users bullied U.S. gymnast Gabby Douglas, who is only 20, for being “unpatriotic” during the Olympics.

The bizarre situation led to many reactions on social media, a pattern that continued in light of Speedo’s decision to drop its sponsorship on Monday:

Speedo publicly drops Ryan Lochte. I always assumed it would be the other way around.

— Kyle Clark (@KyleClark) August 22, 2016

Hard to believe a guy with bleached hair in 2016 would turn out to be a total douche. #LochteMessMonster

— KevinDillon (@Dillonopolous) August 18, 2016

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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UPDATE: Ryan Lochte has since issued an apology for his behavior:

https://t.co/n82dZH2gfl pic.twitter.com/rGp1nmA94G

— Ryan Lochte (@RyanLochte) August 19, 2016

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A bizarre story just got a whole lot messier. Earlier this week, it was reported that Ryan Lochte, along with three other U.S. swimmers, were robbed at gunpoint while returning home from a party in Rio. The news seemed to affirm worries that the country was not in great shape to hold the 2016 Games, which so far had seemed to be incident-free, and the robbery of a high-profile athlete such as Lochte didn’t bode well for the country’s image. However, Brazilian police are now alleging that the swimmers’ accounts of the robbery are not adding up, and a judge has ordered that the passports of Lochte and swimmer Jimmy Feigen be seized so that they can conduct an investigation into the claims. Last night, officials pulled Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz, the other two swimmers involved, off their plane back to the U.S. and detained them.

Lochte has reportedly already left Rio, while Feigen’s location hasn’t been disclosed. Since the news broke, there has been a lot of uncertainty surrounding the details of what occurred late Saturday night. While the International Olympic Committee originally vehemently denied that the robbery took place, it quickly doubled back and confirmed the claims. On Tuesday, Lochte told USA Today that the incident was not originally reported because “we were afraid to get in trouble.”

Now, recent video footage has shed light on inconsistencies in the athletes’ accounts of that night. Footage released by The Daily Mail allegedly shows the athletes returning to the Olympic Village early Sunday morning and going through the x-ray machines with items they claimed were stolen in the incident. The actual timing of the return did not match up with the time that the swimmers claimed to have returned. Additionally, the owner of the gas station where the robbery was said to have occurred also told the Daily Mail that, in the surveillance video he turned over to the police, there was proof that the athletes were never there that night.

It is this video in particular that allegedly prompted the judge to order the passport seizure. Filing a false police report is a punishable offense in Brazil that can lead to jail time.

Fortunately for Lochte, he is back home safe and sound: if he was still hanging around Rio, the judge’s order would prohibit him from leaving the country while the incident was being investigated. His lawyer told CNN that even if an arrest warrant was issued by Brazilian authorities, Lochte would not be turning himself in.

Lochte, the 11-time Olympic medalist, responded to the accusations in a conversation with Matt Lauer. He reportedly told Lauer that Brazilian authorities had not asked him to stay in the country, which is why he left on schedule. He also claimed that he  “wouldn’t make this up,” although there were slight inconsistencies with the account he told Lauer from what he originally told the Today Show’s Billy Bush.

Lochte and the other swimmers better get ready: until and unless their claims are corroborated, they will definitely face anger from the Brazilian people for maligning their country. While there’s a lot of speculation surrounding what exactly happened, one thing’s for certain: an already-unpredictable Olympic Games just got weirder.

Mariam Jaffery

Mariam was an Executive Assistant at Law Street Media and a native of Northern Virginia. She has a B.A. in International Affairs with a minor in Business Administration from George Washington University. Contact Mariam at mjaffery@lawstreetmedia.com.

The post Was Ryan Lochte Lying About the Rio Robbery? Brazilian Investigation Gets Messy appeared first on Law Street.

For the Daily Beast, the past week has been a news outlet’s worst nightmare: earlier this week, a Daily Beast writer decided to do an investigative dive into the gay dating scene at the Rio Olympic village by using the gay dating app, Grindr. Nico Hines’ article, published Wednesday, included details of several different athletes he matched with–height, weight, age, etc. After the article went live seemingly every other web-based outlet on the planet wrote their own pieces about the “sleazy,” and “wildly unethical” story. And on Thursday evening, after heavily revising the article while keeping it up on its site, the Daily Beast removed it entirely.

After removing the article, “The Other Olympic Sport In Rio: Swiping,” editors at the Daily Beast wrote a note condemning their judgement on allowing the article to be written and then revising it while not removing it.

Today we did not uphold a deep set of The Daily Beast’s values. These values—which include standing up to bullies and bigots, and specifically being a proudly, steadfastly supportive voice for LGBT people all over the world—are core to our commitment to journalism and to our commitment to serving our readers.

The Daily Beast was founded in 2010 to “seek out scoops, scandals and stories about secret worlds; we love confronting bullies, bigots and hypocrites,” according to its editor-in-chief John Avalon. But with Hines’ article, some instead saw the outlet as being similar to the people it claimed to be confronting:

shame on @NicoHines/@thedailybeast. LGBTQ+ people deserve respect. we are not your zoo animals. so infuriating. https://t.co/wgCXgTtFyU

— Tyler Oakley (@tyleroakley) August 11, 2016

Amini Fonua, a gay swimmer from Tonga, posted a series of tweets in response to Hines’ article, expressing his concern that in some countries–such as Tonga–being gay is illegal. 

It is still illegal to be gay in Tonga, and while I’m strong enough to be me in front of the world, not everybody else is. Respect that.

— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016

Imagine the one space you can feel safe, the one space you’re able to be yourself, ruined by a straight person who thinks it’s all a joke?

— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016

Hines has yet to respond to his critics, but the Daily Beast owned up to its mistake, and vowed to never act against its ethics again. “We were wrong. We will do better,” the editors wrote.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The Olympics in Rio de Janeiro have finally started, with the official opening ceremony on Friday night celebrating the history and culture of Brazil. But it’s not all fun and games–activism is present too and the Black Lives Matter movement hopes to make its voice heard.

Brazil has had a rough time leading up to the games. The country is in a tough recession, the impeachment of President Dilma Rouseff weighs heavily, doping scandals abound, and the Zika virus and contaminated water concerns have made the games a hard task for organizers.

But the ceremony was a success despite a limited budget, featuring the Brazilian National anthem played by acoustic guitars, and traditional dancing as well as a tribute to the different peoples who make up the country of Brazil.

#Olympics2016 underway with opening ceremony highlighting Brazilian history https://t.co/d01ObmmrsG pic.twitter.com/LJiaXyqqXv

— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) August 6, 2016

This is the first Olympics held in South America, so there are high expectations for this year’s event. And naturally, activists take the opportunity to get their issues acknowledged in the limelight.

The Black Lives Matter movement is well established in the U.S., but Brazil does not yet have an equivalent movement that is as vocal and well organized. That is why on July 23, a couple of activists from BLM traveled to Rio to walk together with some 200 Brazilians in a protest march against police violence. The march ended in a ceremony at the Candelaria Cathedral, the location of the 1993 police killings of eight children sleeping by the church.

The population of Brazil is very diverse due to its history of European explorers, Black slaves, indigenous people, and Japanese immigrants. People with darker skin tones are often discriminated against and victims of police violence–according to an August 2016 report by Human Rights Watch 77 percent of victims of police killings in Brazil are Black.

“The most important thing that we can do is build together and mobilize our people to spread the word,” said Daunasia Yancey, a BLM member among those in Rio, to AOL news.

This obviously isn’t the first time that activists have taken action at the Olympics. Back in 1968, athletes took a stand against racism and police violence when runners Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their fists during the Summer Olympics in Mexico.

https://twitter.com/pbeckham_/status/761656365680951297

Other athletes have gotten involved in this activism as well. Recently, Michael Jordan has spoken out against the shooting of Black Americans by police officers, saying: “I am saddened and frustrated by the divisive rhetoric and racial tensions that seem to be getting worse as of late. I know this country is better than that, and I can no longer stay silent.”

“No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in the Olympic areas” says a clause in the Olympic handbook. But even though it may not be articulated, big sporting events always involve politics in one way or another. It could be an important stage for BLM as well as other movements to highlight their issues during such a widely observed sporting event.

This year, it remains to be seen whether any athletes take action and show their political agenda, and how far they are willing to go.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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