Osama bin Laden
The U.S. had been after bin Laden since the 1998 African embassy bombings. The 13-year manhunt had so little to show for it, some suspected he had died because he hadn't appeared on video since 2007, although audio tapes purportedly of his voice periodically surfaced. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates once admitted that there had been no reliable information for years as to his whereabouts. Bin Laden was generally assumed to be hiding in Pakistan, and that's where 52-year-old Coloradan construction worker Gary Faulkner was detained while looking for him in June 2010. Sent, he says, on a mission from God, Faulkner was found toting a 40-in.-long sword, a pistol, night-vision goggles and a pair of plastic handcuffs. According to Faulkner's brother, the wannabe bounty hunter had, during his six trips to the country, found a cave and "a bearded man in a white robe speaking on a walkie-talkie." But it turns out, Faulkner wasn't that close. On May 1, 2011, Bin Laden was killed by U.S. special operations forces in Abottabad, Pakistan, 35 miles north of the capital, much farther from the Afghan-Pakistan border than most people, including Faulkner, believed.