American swimmer Jimmy Feigen is free to leave Brazil after donating to Rio non-profit
RIO DE JANEIRO — U.S. Olympic swimmer James Feigen has made a donation worth just under $11,000 (35,000 Brazilian reals) to a Brazilian non-profit sporting institution and is now free to leave the country, a Rio court said Friday in a statement.
Following an interview with the swimmer, police had offered a misdemeanor charge against him for false communication of a robbery on the evening of August 19.
In the early hours of Friday morning, a special Olympic court had agreed that if Feigen made the donation to a non-profit institute, he could recover his passport and leave the country. On Friday Feigen was able to prove he had made the donation to the Reaction Institute, a non-profit organization in West Rio where Rafaela Silva, the Brazilian judo fighter who won an Olympic gold, trained. The institution was set up by Brazilian judo Olympian Flávio Canto.
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Officer Marcelo Carregosa, who is second in charge of the special tourist police station in Rio that is dealing with the case, said that under special rules drawn up for the Olympics, a plea bargain could be made for minor crimes where the maximum penalty was less than two years in jail.
“As it is a less serious crime, with a penalty of less than two years of prison, he has the right to a plea bargain. So a plea bargain was done for the value of 35,000 Brazilian reals,” Carregosa told The Post in an interview. “These are special rules of the special court.”
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