By Jane Musgrave 
 
 Palm Beach Post Staff Writer 
 
 — Strapped for cash, Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell didn't think twice about auctioning off a camera he brought back from the moon 40 years ago. 
 
 But Uncle Sam thought about it - plenty. 
 
 Armed with information from a New York auction house, the federal government Thursday sued the 80-year-old suburban Lake Worth man, claiming he was trying to sell property that wasn't his. 
 
 "Defendant Edgar Mitchell is a former NASA employee who is exercising improper dominion and control over a NASA Data Acquisition Camera," government attorneys wrote in the lawsuit filed in federal court. They are asking U.S. District Judge Daniel T.K. Hurley to order Mitchell to return the camera immediately. 
 
 Mitchell, who gained fame in 1971 when he became the sixth man to walk on the moon and has remained in the limelight by lecturing about his beliefs in alien landings and paranormal activity, scoffed at the government's claims. 
 
 "It's utter nonsense," he said. 
 
 During the moon mission era, he said he and other astronauts got permission to take mementoes from the space crafts. "We have dozens of pieces. All of us who flew to the moon," he said. 
 
 Had they not brought them back, they would have been destroyed, he said. After astronauts climbed back into the command module for the roughly 250,000-mile trip home, engineers in Houston blew up the lunar module, he said. 
 
 "It was government throwaways, government junk," he said of the various items he salvaged. His most prized possession is a hand controller from the Apollo 14 spacecraft. 
 
 "They were going to throw it away on the lunar surface, so why not?" he asked. 
 
 Apollo 12 astronaut Alan Bean, who was also a commander of Skylab 3 in 1973, said the rules changed, perhaps after Mitchell retired in 1972. 
 
 At some point, he estimated about 35 years ago, he and others were ordered to return anything they got in connection with their NASA duties. He recalled that he was forced to return a dagger and his wife to hand over a bracelet they received as gifts in Morocco when he and other astronauts took part in a worldwide goodwill tour. 
 
 "I gave all of my stuff back," he said. "I didn't have anything as good as a camera." 
 
 The two cameras he and astronaut Pete Conrad took to the moon in 1969 stayed there, he said. "They're probably still up there," he said from Houston where he works as a painter, billing himself as "the only artist to walk on the moon." 
 
 Mitchell, he said, shouldn't be faulted. Others, he said, probably didn't return their space goodies. 
 
 "Be kind to Ed," he said. "These things, back in those days, it wasn't important. We were trying to get to the moon and get back alive. The other stuff, it wasn't important." 
 
 It seems unlikely the federal government is going to heed that advice. 
 
 Already, it persuaded Bonhams auction house to pull the camera from a planned May 5 sale, where the sellers estimated it would fetch as much as $80,000. "There are no current plans to offer the camera at a Bonhams auction," said a New York City spokeswoman for the British-based auction house. 
 
 Mitchell acknowledged that the government asked him to return the camera in the past. But, he said, he thought the issue had been resolved. 
 
 Many collectors love space memorabilia. Now, he said, some worry the government will seize items that have cost them plenty. 
 
 "It's just a tempest in a teapot," he said. ||||| NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. government has sued a former NASA astronaut to recover a camera used to explore the moon's surface during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission after seeing it slated for sale at a New York auction. 
 
 The lawsuit, filed in Miami federal court, accuses Edgar Mitchell of illegally possessing the camera and attempting to sell it for profit. 
 
 In March NASA learned that the British auction house Bonhams was planning to sell the camera at a Space History Sale, according to the suit filed on Wednesday. 
 
 The item was labelled "Movie Camera from the Lunar Surface" and billed as one of two cameras from the Apollo 14's lunar module Antares. The lot description said the item came "directly from the collection" of pilot Edgar Mitchell and had a pre-sale estimate of $60,000 (37,400 pounds) to $80,000, the suit said. 
 
 Mitchell was a lunar module pilot on Apollo 14, which launched its nine-day mission in 1971 under the command of Alan Shepard. The sixth person to walk on the moon, Mitchell is now retired and runs a website selling his autographed picture. 
 
 He has made headlines for his stated belief in the existence of extraterrestrial life. 
 
 "All equipment and property used during NASA operations remains the property of NASA unless explicitly released or transferred to another party," the government suit said, adding NASA had no record of the camera being given to Mitchell. 
 
 The suit said the government had made repeated requests to Mitchell and his lawyer to return the camera but received no response. 
 
 Mitchell's lawyer, Donald Jacobson, said NASA management was aware of and approved Mitchell's ownership of the camera 40 years ago. Continued...
– NASA is suing the sixth man on the moon for a camera that he says would have ended up as "government trash" or moon litter if he hadn't kept it. Government lawyers got involved after Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell attempted to sell the lunar movie camera at auction, where it was expected to fetch up to $80,000, Reuters reports. The 80-year-old astro rejects NASA's claim that he is "exercising improper dominion and control" over its camera and should return it immediately. Mitchell—who admits that NASA has asked for the camera before—says moon mission astronauts were allowed to keep plenty of mementos. "We have dozens of pieces, all of us who flew to the moon," he tells the Palm Beach Post. Apollo 12 astronaut Alan Bean, the fourth man to walk on the moon, says he left behind the camera he took there in 1969. "Be kind to Ed," he says. "These things, back in those days, it wasn't important. We were trying to get to the moon and get back alive. The other stuff, it wasn't important."