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Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
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Jesse Ventura Takes on ‘American Sniper’ Print

MINNEAPOLIS (CN) - Flush with a $1.8 million defamation verdict against the writer of "American Sniper," former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura has now taken aim at HarperCollins Publishers.

Ventura filed his federal complaint Monday in the same court where, earlier this year, the former wrestler received a cushy judgment from the estate of "American Sniper" memoirist Chris Kyle.

The earlier case proved that Kyle, a Navy SEAL whom a U.S. Marine shot and killed at a Texas gun range in 2013, fabricated a section of his 2012 book in which he describes punching Ventura in a 2006 California bar fight after Ventura allegedly spoke ill of fallen soldiers.

Kyle titled this subchapter "Punching Out Scruff Face."

Though Ventura, who notes that he is a former Navy SEAL as well, allegedly used photographic evidence to disprove Kyle's story, New York-based Harper Collins released an October 2013 memorial edition of "American Sniper" that still includes the false bar-fight story.

HarperCollins knew that Ventura had evidence proving that the incident was fabricated when it went to print, according to the complaint.

During the July 2014 trial, HarperCollins publicist Sharon Rosenblum's testimony "established that the Ventura story and resulting controversy and publicity were largely responsible for the book's success," the complaint states.

Claiming that HarperCollins still profits off the sales of "American Sniper," Ventura wants $75,000 in damages.

He is represented by David Bradley Olsen with Henson & Efron.

A movie adaptation of "American Sniper" directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Bradley Cooper is set to be released in 2015.

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