Petraeus Mistress: I Had Access to State Secrets

Paula Broadwell may have leaked classified info in speech
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 12, 2012 6:25 AM CST
Petraeus Mistress: I Had Access to State Secrets
In the frame grab from C-SPAN Book TV video taken Feb. 6, 2012, author Paula Broadwell speaks to an audience at the Politics and Prose bookstore in Washington.   (AP Photo/C-SPAN Book TV)

David Petraeus' biographer and mistress says she had inside information on CIA activities—a piece of which she may have revealed in a speech last month. In a panel chat this summer, she said she would "sit in on high level meetings with General Petraeus" during which she'd "listen to classified chatter of terrorist talk and so forth," Politico reports. And in its probe into the affair, the FBI found classified information on Paula Broadwell's computer, which she'd voluntarily handed over. But Petraeus said he hadn't provided her with the documents, and the bureau concluded he hadn't violated any laws, reports the New York Times.

Regardless of where she obtained the information, it appears she may have leaked some of it. In a University of Denver speech last month, Broadwell said the attack on Benghazi may have been an effort to retrieve three militia members who'd been taken prisoner. "Now, I don’t know if a lot of you heard this," she said, "but the CIA annex had ... taken a couple of Libyan militia members prisoner and they think that the attack on the consulate was an effort to try to get these prisoners back." Fox News had earlier reported that the annex—separate from the attacked consulate—had held the prisoners, a story Fox today confirms via a "well-placed Washington source." The CIA, however, tells the Daily Beast that "any suggestion that the Agency is still in the detention business is uninformed and baseless." Broadwell may simply have been misremembering the details of the Fox report, the Beast notes. (More David Petraeus stories.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X