A Navy SEAL who participated in the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden says he’s on the hook for millions of dollars to the federal government after lousy legal advice led to him accidentally disclosing classified information in his tell-all book.
Matt Bissonnette, who published “No Easy Day” in 2012 under the pen name Mark Owen, socked his former lawyer Kevin Podlaski and the Indiana-based firm of Carson Boxberger with a $8 million lawsuit in Manhattan federal court.
The suit claims his reputation was ruined and his security clearance was lost after the lawyers advised him that the book’s content didn’t need to go through Department of Defense censors – and that they could weed out classified information on their own.
The decorated SEAL — who previously told CBS’s 60 Minutes that the feds are considering charging him with disclosing classified information — revealed in the suit that he actually has negotiated a settlement to forfeit a “majority of income” he has received from the book and well as future income.
“This payment is growing daily and is currently in excess of $4,500,000,” the suit says. “Plaintiff will also lose all movie rights and the income attributable to those rights, believed to be in excess of $900,000 and he has suffered damages in connection with lost book sales of his [soon-to-be released] second book, ‘No Hero,’” Bissonnette had planned to “donate a substantial portion of any sale proceeds to charity.”
Messages left with Podlaski and Carson Boxberger were not immediately returned.
Meanwhile, FOX News is set to air an interview on Nov. 11 and 12 with the Navy SEAL who killed bin Laden.