A decorated former Navy SEAL known for his role in the killing of terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden landed behind bars on Wednesday.
Robert J. O’Neill was arrested in Texas on charges of assault causing bodily injury and public intoxication, according to The Brunswick News.
Collin County jail records indicate the veteran was bailed out of jail the same day.
The former Navy Seal who generated controversy when he claimed he was the member of Team Six that shot and killed Osama Bin Laden has been arrested in Frisco. Robert O’Neill was taken to the Collin County jail charged w/ assault causing serious bodily injury, class A misdemeanor pic.twitter.com/QypgsQmf2L
— J.D. Miles (@jdmiles11) August 25, 2023
O’Neill has indicated in the past that he fired the actual, fatal shots in the killing of Bin Laden.
The special forces veteran recounted the operation in his 2017 book “The Operator: Firing the Shots that Killed Osama Bin Laden and My Years as a SEAL Team Warrior.”
In that book, O’Neill described one interaction in which the Islamist leader was shot dead in his own bedroom after declining to surrender.
Retired senior naval officer William McRaven has corroborated his account, according to the U.K. Daily Mirror.
This isn’t the first run-in with the law that O’Neill has had since leaving the Navy in 2012.
Montana prosecutors dropped a driving under the influence charge against O’Neill in 2016, according to CBS News.
The 47-year-old Navy veteran agreed to complete a treatment program with the Department of Veterans Affairs to treat a condition incurred through his military service.
O’Neill hasn’t publicly addressed his Wednesday arrest since bailing out of jail.
The nature of events that led to his arrest aren’t readily apparent as of Saturday afternoon.
O’Neill appeared in a photo geolocated in Texas posted Thursday on his Instagram account.
The former Fox News commentator appeared in a Twitter video promoting an episode of his podcast on Friday.
Episode 59. https://t.co/am29b3qjnK pic.twitter.com/jLR0CSDxVD
— Robert J. O’Neill (@mchooyah) August 25, 2023
The veteran of the Navy’s elite SEAL Team 6 has previously suggested he’d consider a run for political office, and criticized partisan ideology in the military.
I would like to say “Thank You” to this man for what he did for our nation. If I had been the one who killed Bin Laden, I’d be proud of it, too! I would also like to say that being arrested for a misdemeanor assault is no big deal. If he needs help with his temper or PTSD, he can certainly get it.
God Bless and keep you Rob – you might be a “bad boy” but you are a real good Man” you spent all day at a hospital in Amarillo Tx with my brother who was a Viet Nam Vet and a great patriot – he was not going to get to go to the Armed forces banquet where you were an honored guest and speaker, he is in heaven not but your visit put a smile on his face and gave him great comfort before his passing on July 4 Thank you Rob for your service and your continued servce to our country –
Sure he could run for Nancy’s job she’s an alcoholic and she is retiring and this alcoholic could take her place and act just like the bitch from California!!!!
To begin with, I am very suspicious about the claim that he or anyone else killed Ben Laden. Especially when you consider that the rest of that squad were all killed in a very questionable ‘copter crash. And also that Ben Laden could have quietly hidden there for years and not be found? Really? I think Ben Laden was killed in one of those bunker buster attackes years before and was long dead by then.