Tyler Clementi (left) and Dharun Ravi
West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North/AP
Dharun Ravi blames his immaturity – not a strain of criminal-level hate – for his actions leading up to Rutgers roommate Tyler Clementi's suicide."I was 18 ... I did do things wrong and I was stupid about a lot of stuff," he tells ABC News, of allegedly using a camera to internet-spy on Clementi kissing a man in their dorm room. "I was a dumb kid not thinking about it."
Ravi, 19, who was found guilty of invasion of privacy and hate crimes, insists he is not homophobic.
"I didn't act out of hate and I wasn't uncomfortable with Tyler being gay," he says in a separate interview with New Jersey's The Star-Ledger newspaper. "I won't ever … tell the world I hated Tyler because he was gay, or tell the world that I was trying to hurt or intimidate him because it's not true."
Ravi says he realized his roommate, also 18, "had bigger problems" that may have contributed to his decision to jump off the George Washington Bridge in September 2010.
"Before I went to school I thought my roommate would be my best friend and we would hang out all the time," he tells The Star-Ledger. "But Tyler wasn't like that. He was very quiet and every conversation we had just hit a dead end."