Navy SEAL who claimed to kill Bin Laden arrested in Texas

The Navy SEAL who gained fame when he publicly claimed to have been the person who killed Usama bin Laden was arrested in Texas.

Robert J. O’Neill, the 47-year-old former member of SEAL Team Six, was arrested in Frisco, Texas, and charged with misdemeanor assault and public intoxication, according to a report from the New York Post Saturday.

O’Neill was booked in Frisco and released the same day on a $3,500 bond, while jail records showed only the assault charge, according to the report.

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The former SEAL was in town to record a podcast at a cigar lounge.

The Frisco Police Department did not immediately respond to a Fox News request for comment.

O’Neill gained fame after publicly claiming to be the Navy SEAL who killed Usama bin Laden during the infamous raid on his compound in Pakistan in May 2011, eventually recounting the story in his 2017 book, “The Operator.”

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Publishing the book was controversial within the special warfare community, which typically abides by a code of silence when it comes to covert missions. The U.S. government has never confirmed O’Neill’s accounting of the raid, while fellow former SEAL Matt Bissonnette claimed in a book of his own that O’Neill’s story was false. A different SEAL had fired the shots that killed the infamous terrorist mastermind, Bissonnette said.

O’Neill has also had previous run-ins with law enforcement, according to a report from WNCT, including a 2016 arrest on suspicion of driving under the influence in his native Montana, In that case, authorities said they found O’Neill sleeping in the driver’s seat of his car that was still running. O’Neil entered a not guilty plea in that case, arguing he had taken “a prescribed sleep aid to help with long-standing severe insomnia.”

Prosecutors eventually agreed to drop the charge after determining his medication was to blame, though he was charged with negligent endangerment under an agreement that allowed him to defer prosecution while he participated in a treatment plan with the Department of Veterans Affairs.

 

O’Neill was also banned from flying on Delta Airlines in 2020 after posting a photo of himself not wearing a mask on a flight, despite a COVID requirement in effect at the time.

O’Neil did not immediately respond to a Fox News request for comment.