〜を。。。だ inside a と言う clause


In the ASK Graded Reader ゴン狐, the following sentence appears:

> 魚売りは、おれ **を** 泥棒 **だ** と言って、。。。

I have seen that using を。。。と言う is like saying 'to call somebody something.' My
issue is that there is a だ at the end of the clause. I would _expect_ it to be
either おれが。。。だと or おれを。。。と, but the two together confuses me.

How does this make sense? Would it not be correct to say おれが泥棒だと言った?




This 言う is a member of [this verb
group](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/55158/5010), so だ before と is
optional. (This reminds me of the "optional _being_ " in English, as in "to
regard me as being a thief" vs "to regard me as a thief".)

I would say this type of と is **not** quotative- _to_ because the part marked
with と is a simple noun (phrase) rather than a sentence.

俺が泥棒だと言って would tend to be taken as "saying 'I am the thief'" (i.e., the 魚売り
is calling himself a thief).

