LiAngelo Ball has spoken out for the first time on his arrest and detainment in China for shoplifting, and the picture he paints is one of a teenager who got swept up by others’ misdeeds and ended up in over his head in a hurry.

“We all went out one night, went to the malls, went to the Louis Vuitton store,” he told “The Today Show” on Tuesday morning. “People started taking stuff. Me just not thinking and being with them, I started taking stuff too.”