WASHINGTON -- A former leader of Atlanta's bid for the 1996 Olympics said his group violated the gift rules of the International Olympic Committee in its pursuit of the Summer Games, the Washington Post reported Friday.
Charlie Battle, who served on both the bid committee, which works to land the Games, and the organizing committee, which is responsible for staging them, told the paper he and other members of the bid committee ignored the IOC's gift limitation -- then $200 -- in dispensing mementos such as $475 golf clubs to IOC members who visited the city from 1988 to 1990.Although the International Olympic Committee allows bid committees to provide first-class airplane tickets to its members and one guest of their choosing, Battle told the Post that Atlanta at times invited an additional family member, usually a son or daughter -- a perk that could cost $10,000 or more.
But the Post said Battle repeatedly insisted in an interview Wednesday night that the committee did "nothing wrong" because the IOC gift-giving rule was widely ignored and he did not consider the gifts excessive.
"I'm proud of what we did," Battle told the paper, adding, "We didn't do anything illegal, immoral, unethical or what I felt was improper, given the context of lavish hospitality and entertainment that was the accepted route."
Battle, an attorney who now is president of a downtown Atlanta development group, said former Atlanta Olympic Committee members had not been contacted by the Justice Department.
Battle and former Atlanta committee president Billy Payne have publicly said in recent days they were unaware of any improprieties during the two-year bidding process.
Atlanta's campaign to win the right to the Olympics cost $7.8 million, according to bid committee documents. The committee spent $376,545 during one trip alone -- to the crucial 1990 IOC meeting in Tokyo at which the Games were awarded.
Often, Atlanta bid committee officials distributed gifts that addressed individual interests of the international committee's members, Battle told the Post.
"We got one a compass for one member and some books about European history for another. We gave Prince Albert (of Monaco) a lithograph of Amherst, where he went to college, signed by the president of the college. It was no big deal, but it was something we felt would be special to him," he said.
The International Olympic Committee has asked cities that bid for five Olympics -- those from 1996 to 2004 -- to report improprieties in the process. It set a deadline of last Monday for submission of these reports, but the United States Olympic Committee, which will forward Atlanta's report to it, has requested an extension, according to the Post.
Two dozen IOC members have been implicated in the acceptance of improper gifts or cash payments or both from the Salt Lake City bid committee.
In other Olympics-scandal developments reported by the Associated Press:
-- The Salt Lake Organizing Committee attorney who was on the team that plied IOC members with cash and freebies will remain on the job, President Mitt Romney decided late Thursday afternoon.
Kelly Flint, senior vice president of marketing and legal affairs, had been on paid leave since Jan. 8, when Chief Executive Officer Frank Joklik and Senior Vice President David Johnson resigned. Former President Tom Welch was stripped of his lucrative pension and consulting contract during the same house cleaning.
Licensing director Rod Hamson will remain on paid leave pending further evaluation in the next 30 days, said SLOC spokeswoman Caroline Shaw.
-- The Justice Department said reports of four prosecutors and 15 FBI agents investigating the Salt Lake Olympics case were "not too far off."
"We have a pretty substantial presence out there in terms of lawyers and investigators," Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder said, declining to provide any details about the case.
-- The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints acknowledged its family history department researched the genealogy of Dick Pound, the IOC vice president from Canada who is leading the IOC investigation into the scandal, and presented him with a family history.
Such gifts of goodwill are common when prominent people visit the LDS Church's Salt Lake headquarters, the church said in a statement.
No value could be affixed to the gift because volunteers and staffers worked on it during slack times, the church said. Family histories purchased commercially can run into the tens of thousands of dollars.
-- A former ski official said Salt Lake City "robbed" U.S. winter sports athletes of $3 million in unkept promises made in its bid for the Winter Olympics. Howard Peterson, who stepped down as executive director of the U.S. Skiing Association in 1994, called for Utah authorities to pay the money now to help get American athletes ready for 2002.
-- The Swedish national prosecutor's office has launched an investigation into activities of the bid committee that tried to bring the 2004 Summer Games to Stockholm. That followed a report that the panel provided $200,000 for an athletes' exchange program the Swedish Olympic Committee signed with six African countries days before the IOC voted on the site for the Games. Athens won that vote in 1997.
Newspapers also said the bid committee paid for medical care for several IOC members or their spouses. The bid committee said in the letter that those were cases of emergency needs, which it was obliged to pay.
-- The world's sports federations, led by the highest-ranking Olympic official implicated in the Salt Lake scandal, declared its support for IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch. The ruling council of the General Association of International Sports Federations called for the Olympic movement to "maintain unity." The group is led by South Korea's Un Yong Kim, who has been cited by IOC and Salt Lake investigators.
-- The chief of the Sydney Olympics said the IOC should bear a share of cutbacks if the 2000 Games fall short of their marketing target. Sandy Hollway ruled out renegotiating the Sydney Organizing Committee's deal that guarantees the Australian Olympic Committee $65 million, regardless of the financial outcome of the Games.
-- Former Australian Olympics Minister Bruce Baird said Sydney newspapers made a secret deal not to report on the lavish wooing of IOC members in the city's successful bid for the 2000 Olympics. Newspaper officials vehemently denied the allegations.
-- The president of the International Ski Federation said winter sports officials want a major role in choosing Winter Olympic host cities. Gian-Franco Kasper said at least half of the choice of Olympic sites should be based on sports. He said it was "the only way to restore the credibility" of the IOC.