Petraeus Knew His Mistress' Harassing E-Mails Were Being Investigated Last Summer

Gen. David Petraeus knew months ago that federal officials were investigating his relationship with Paula Broadwell after his friend, Jill Kelley, alerted him to the fact that the FBI had identified her as the anonymous person who had been sending her harassing e-mails starting last spring warning her "to stop behavior she viewed as overly friendly toward Petraeus, or she would be exposed," the Washington Post is reporting tonight. The Post says Petraeus contacted Broadwell in mid-summer after learning of her actions from Kelley and told her to knock it off.

Former CIA director David H. Petraeus told the woman with whom he was having an extramarital affair to stop sending threatening e-mails to a family friend, Jill Kelley, after a federal investigation determined who was behind the harassment.

The move by Petraeus came in mid-summer after Kelley contacted a friend who worked as an FBI agent in Tampa, where she lived, beginning a process that would eventually force the former four-star former general to resign last week . . .

Kelley was informed that Broadwell was the sender, although she told investigators that she did not know the woman, according to the person close to Kelley.

At some point, Kelley told Petraeus about the e-mails and named Broadwell as the person who had sent them. That may have prompted the CIA director to send his own e-mails to Broadwell, telling her to stop the harassment, the law enforcement officials said.

People close to Petraeus say his affair with Broadwell ended four months ago, around the time he e-mailed her about the harassment . . .
 

The Post says that when the FBI confronted Broadwell about the e-mails, she acknowledged she was having an affair with Petraeus and immediately turned her computer over to them. Petraeus has denied that he gave classified documents that FBI agents found on Broadwell's computer. By late summer, the FBI had notified the Justice Department of the investigation according to the Post, which claims federal prosecutors never bothered to question Petraeus about his relationship until the week of October 21, months after it had first learned about it, when the Post says Petraeus first acknowledged his relationship with Broadwell. The Post also claims that it was Kelley's friend who worked for the FBI who grew frustrated about the progress of the investigation and contracted U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor to complain. "The FBI agent in Tampa had been taken off the investigation by that time," the Post reports. "He was frustrated by the investigation’s apparent lack of progress, according to the person close to Kelley. But the agent recently got in touch with the Washington office of Rep. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) to express concern. Reichert then contacted Rep. Eric Cantor (Va.), the House Republican leader." Okay, so if Kelley is friends with Petraeus and concerned about his well-being, why was her friend in the FBI pushing for disclosure of his affair with Broadwell? Pretty strange friends our CIA Director was keeping.