‘Survivor’ winner Richard Hatch remains defiant

BOSTON— The sheriff who oversaw “Survivor” winner Richard Hatch’s time in a Massachusetts jail said Hatch is lying about his treatment behind bars.

Hatch told NBC’s “Today” show Tuesday that sheriff’s deputies took him away in his boxer shorts in August after he granted unauthorized TV interviews while serving the remainder of his federal tax evasion sentence on home confinement.

One of those interviews was with NBC 10 News.

Barnstable County Sheriff James Cummings said Hatch refused to get dressed. Hatch, who lives in Rhode Island, was known for walking around naked on the CBS reality show.

Hatch also complained of serving solitary confinement in a filthy cell, but Cummings said Hatch wasn’t in solitary confinement and Hatch himself inspected the cell to make sure it was clean before he stayed in it.

Cummings calls Hatch “a stranger to the truth.“

Hatch was convicted in 2006 of failing to pay taxes on the $1 million he won on the CBS reality show in 2000.

He had been serving the final portion of his 51-month sentence in home confinement when he gave the interviews. He’s now free and looking for a job.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Providence would not comment.