New details have emerged about the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden. The New York Times reports four Obama administration lawyers worked in secret for weeks ahead of the raid to devise a legal justification for it. According to the Times, the four lawyers were CIA general counsel Stephen Preston, National Security Council legal adviser Mary DeRosa, Joint Chiefs of Staff legal adviser James Crawford and Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, who was at the time the Pentagon’s general counsel. The framework they created reportedly allowed the Obama administration to send U.S. ground forces into Pakistan without Pakistani consent, to explicitly authorize a lethal mission, to delay telling Congress until the raid was completed and to bury a wartime enemy at sea. Stephen Preston reportedly said in the days leading up to the raid, “We should memorialize our rationales because we may be called upon to explain our legal conclusions, particularly if the operation goes terribly badly.” Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh has raised significant questions about the Obama administration’s account of the raid, reporting that top Pakistani military leaders knew about the operation and provided key assistance.