Unreleased: Probe Finds CIA Honcho Disclosed Top Secret Info to Hollywood

Tweet

June 5, 2013

In a new article, the Project On Government Oversight revealed a previously unreleased Defense Department Inspector General’s office report that says former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta disclosed top secret information at an event attended by a Hollywood executive working on the movie Zero Dark Thirty.

The draft Inspector General (IG) report details a June 2011 Central Intelligence Agency ceremony honoring the participants in the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. At the event, Panetta recognized the ground commander of the raid by name, which is protected from public release.

From POGO’s article:

The IG report recounts that [Mark Boal, screenwriter of Zero Dark Thirty] was permitted to attend a June 24, 2011, ceremony at CIA headquarters honoring personnel involved in the May 2011 bin Laden raid. The fact that the screenwriter was allowed to attend has been reported previously and has been a subject of controversy. The IG report provides new details about the event—notably, that Panetta’s remarks contained information classified as Secret and Top Secret.

Others involved in the raid were not happy.

The IG report says special operations personnel were not pleased to discover that an outsider was at the CIA event. At a reception following the ceremony, Admiral William H. McRaven, one of the raid’s overseers, was introduced to a person “identified as the maker of the ‘Hurt Locker,’” the draft report says. “ADM McRaven and DoD special operators present were all ‘universally surprised and shocked’ that a Hollywood executive attended this CIA Headquarters awards ceremony.”

Read more about the report, how the Inspector General office handled it, and how this incident was treated compared to other leaks of top secret information in POGO’s full article.

Image from the Department of Defense.

Topics: Government Accountability

Related Content: Watching the Watchdogs

Authors: Andre Francisco

Project On Government Oversight (POGO)

1100 G Street, NW, Suite 500    Washington, DC 20005
Phone: (202) 347-1122     Fax: (202) 347-1116     Email: info@pogo.org

POGO is a 501(c)(3) organization. All donations are tax-deductible.

Founded in 1981, the Project On Government Oversight is a nonpartisan independent watchdog that champions good government reforms. POGO’s investigations into corruption, misconduct, and conflicts of interest achieve a more effective, accountable, open, and ethical federal government.