The Rio Public Ministry believes that the $10,800 charitable donation made by American swimmer Jimmy Feigen to escape prosecution for allegedly falsifying a police report is insufficient “given the gravity and negative repercussion of the fact.”
According to the USA Today, the Public Ministry, which is a prosecutorial body, originally asked Feigen to pay 150,000 Brazilian Reais, which comes out to just under $46,800 USD. A judge later set the amount at 35,000 Reais, or about $10,900 at current exchange rates, which allowed Feigen to leave the country.
The donation is earmarked for the Instituto Reação (Reaction Institute), which is a judo academy founded by former Olympic medalist Flavio Canton. Among previous voluntary benefactors to the academy is American mixed martial arts superstar Rhonda Rousey, who made a $30,000 donation to the organization.
Feigen’s attorneys said that the Public Ministry’s demand was “disproportional” compared to his financial status, but the Public Ministry has appealed the amount saying that it was agreed to without their approval.
Feigen was one of two swimmers, along with Ryan Lochte, who were indicted this week in Brazil on charges of falsifying a police report with relation to an incident that happened at a Rio gas station early on Sunday morning. There has been no word yet on whether Lochte will be offered a similar arrangement for his side of the indictment, as he returned to the United States before Brazilian authorities could prevent him from leaving the country. The other two swimmers, Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger, returned to the United States on Friday morning and were held as witnesses to the event and not indicted.
Lochte, who has hired crisis manager Matthew Hiltzik who has previously worked as a crisis manager for the likes of Justin Bieber, is expected to give an exclusive interview to NBC on Saturday evening.
Lochte, Bentz, and Conger so far have made public statements on the matter, though none has come from Feigen.
The idea of “let the punishment fit the crime” apparently does not exist to Brazilians.
Now it just seems liking gouging. Drop it Rio.
Where is Jimmy, did he get back? There hasn’t been any comment or statement .
The judge already set the fine as part of the settlement. I agree case is closed. Brazilian prosecutors should not ask for more money after the fact.
I’m sure they want retribution. That’s understandable, but this particular story is ridiculous. When the court accepted Feigen’s $11k payment, the matter was closed. They don’t get to decide it wasn’t enough, then go back and change the terms of the deal after the fact.
I just saw the Al Roker–Billy Bush debate. After saying Locjte lied, repeatedly, in a very loud voice, Roker said Lochte skedaddled leaving his teammates hanging. With this comment Roker simply assumed that the Brazilians would take it out on his teammates if Lochte left the country. In other words, Roker simply assumed that the Brazilians were uncivilized.
Brazil is using this opportunity to embarrass the US. Ugh.
Heaven knows Brazil has enough to be embarrassed about already…….I know Brazilians here living in the US, none of them want to go back and live in Brazil.
From the American point of view, they’ve portrayed cracking a piece of poster sized plexiglass into an act of vandalism equivalent to painting Hitler mustache on the Mona Lisa, and then extracted an $11,000 fine/bribe out of Feign for a fib that would have cost the average Brazilian a hundred or two. Now a minister is suggesting it should be $40k plus? GTFO, you money grabbing SOBs. You got your pound of flesh and stack of bills already. Asking for more at this is seriously overplaying your hand.