At the memorial service for Nelson Mandela in South Africa this week, many were justifiably outraged over a sign language interpreter who performed “unintelligible” gestures as he stood by President Barack Obama and many other world leaders.

The AP has since interviewed the man, Thamsanqa Jantjie, and the story is pretty weird. According to Jantjie, “he hallucinated that angels were entering the stadium,” and he became panicked because of all the armed guards and policeman present. Jantjie told the AP that he suffers from schizophrenia and, in the past, has been hospitalized in a mental health clinic for more than a year. Jantjie also said he has a history of violence because of his mental illness.

Here’s what Jantjie told the AP about what happened during the memorial service:

“What happened that day, I see angels come to the stadium … I start realizing that the problem is here. And the problem, I don’t know the attack of this problem, how will it comes. Sometimes I react violent on that place. Sometimes I will see things that chase me,” Jantjie said.

“I was in a very difficult position,” he added. “And remember those people, the president and everyone, they were armed, there was armed police around me. If I start panicking I’ll start being a problem. I have to deal with this in a manner so that I mustn’t embarrass my country.”

Jantjie—an actual interpreter who has successfully interpreted many events, he told CNN—also apologized for his unintelligible signing during the memorial service, saying “I would like to tell everybody that if I’ve offended anyone, please, forgive me.” But he also went on to say that he “[didn’t] remember any of [that] at all,” when AP played back the footage for him.

The story gets weirder: AP tried to figure out how Jantjie, who has a long history of mental illness, could have gotten the necessary security clearances and what company would hire him, only to reach some suspicious roadblocks. South African government officials tried to find the company they got Jantjie through, but apparently the company has “vanished into thin air.” What’s more is that when the AP visited the address of the company provided by Jantji, as well as try the number he gave them, a completely different, unrelated company responded, who knew nothing of a company offering sign-language interpretation services.

Currently, the South African government, who was responsible for contracting the company that provided Jantjie, is investigating what exactly happened.

You can watch AP’s full interview with Jantjie below: