And then the jury awarded Ventura US$500,000 in damages for the defamation claim and $1.3 million for the unjust enrichment claim. The lawyers agreed to accept an 8–2 verdict. The jury deliberated for six days and appeared to be deadlocked. Although Kyle never identified “Scruff Face” in the book itself, he did tell interviewers that he was referring to Ventura.īecause Kyle was killed in a shooting in Texas about a year after Ventura filed his suit in 2012, the evidence about what really happened in the bar came from contradictory testimony by Ventura himself and a parade of witnesses produced by the attorneys for both sides. Ventura sought millions of dollars in damages, not only for defamation, but also for Kyle’s use of his name and image to promote the book. He told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that if he lost his libel case, he would be so distraught that he would move to Mexico.
Ventura said the encounter never happened and that Kyle’s book had destroyed his reputation in the SEAL community and his career as a television personality. Kyle described how he punched a man identified as “Scruff Face” after he said he “hated America,” that Navy SEALS “were killing men and women and children and murdering” and that they “deserved to lose a few” in the war in Iraq.
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In July 2014, Jesse “The Body” Ventura, wrestling Hall of Fame inductee, former governor of Minnesota and professional conspiracy theorist, spent three weeks convincing eight jurors in federal court in Minneapolis that his reputation was damaged by former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle’s account of a bar fight in his book, American Sniper. Jesse Ventura, during his brief stint as governor of Minnesota.
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