It was a married Florida woman who blew the lid off the scandalous affair that led retired Gen. David Petraeus to resign as CIA chief when she told the FBI of allegedly threatening e-mails she’d received from his lover, sources said yesterday.
Jill Kelley, 37, of Tampa — a “social liaison” to the powerful Joint Special Operations Command — reported the jealous messages from Petraeus biographer Paula Broadwell, who is accused of sleeping with the married four-star general, to the FBI, sources said.
When Kelley read Broadwell’s e-mails, she was so scared that she went to the FBI for protection, according to a source, who said she initially approached a Florida field office of the FBI — not its headquarters — with a complaint of cyber-harassment.She had received numerous intimidating e-mails from a handful of pseudonymous addresses.
The nature of the e-mails, according to the source, was “I know what you’re doing” and similar suggestions that someone was on to Kelley. There was no explicit threat of violence.
The feds — fearing that the nation’s top spy was the victim of an e-mail hacker — traced the messages to Broadwell, and in the process discovered tawdry messages between her and Petraeus.
High-level Justice Department officials knew by late summer of an ongoing investigation involving Petraeus, a source said.
The married Broadwell, 40, told Kelley to “back off,” “stay away from my guy,” and warned, “I know what you did,” sources have told The Post.
Initial reports said the relationship ended before Petraeus took over the CIA in September 2011, but yesterday, ABC News and The Wall Street Journal said the affair actually began shortly after he was sworn in and ended only a few months ago.
“We and our family have been friends with General Petraeus and his family for over five years. We respect his and his family’s privacy and want the same for us and our three children,” Kelley said in a statement.
