Angelina Jolie once offered to act as bait to capture Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony

No one would ever turn down a dinner date with Angelina Jolie — or at least that was the thinking behind the actress' offer in 2012 to act as bait to lure Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony to a meal and then arrest him, The Sunday Times reports.

Kony is the head of a guerilla group known as the Lord's Resistance Army, and he has remained frustratingly elusive to international forces since his 2005 conviction of crimes against humanity. Under Kony, more than 60,000 children have been abducted to become soldiers; the warlord was famously the target of Invisible Children's Kony 2012 campaign, which sought to increase awareness of his atrocities.

Jolie's 2012 proposal was uncovered in a leak of 40,000 International Criminal Court (ICC) emails to the French website Mediapart. Former ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo wrote in one: "Forget other celebrities, [Jolie is] the one. She is ready. Probably Brad [Pitt] will go also."

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

While the plan was never carried out, Moreno Ocampo and Jolie personally exchanged several emails on the topic. "Apparently you can be embedded with the special forces that are chasing Kony. Can Brad go with you?" Moreno Ocampo wrote to the actress in one email.

"Brad is being supportive. Let’s discuss logistics. Much love Xxx," Jolie reportedly replied.

The plan might not have been as far-fetched as it sounds: Actor Sean Penn's sit-down with drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman might have inadvertently led to the notorious criminal's capture last year.