KRIS PARONTO
If you saw “13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi,” you saw 1999 UNO graduate Kris Paronto. Sort of. The 2016 movie by Director Michael Bay brought to life the real-life story of the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on a U.S. compound in Libya that resulted in the death of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. Among the heroic security team members who fought their way out of Libya that day was Paronto. “Tanto” in the movie, he is portrayed by Pablo Schreiber. The movie is based on a book Paronto co-authored with his fellow security contractors in Benghazi: “13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi.” A U.S. Army Ranger before becoming a security contractor, Paronto more recently has authored “The Ranger Way: Living the Code On and Off the Battlefield.”