David Petraeus, the well-known retired U.S. Army general and CIA director, has reached a plea deal with the Department of Justice after admitting to sharing classified information with his biographer and mistress, Paula Broadwell.
“The plea agreement and corresponding statement of facts, both signed by the defendant, indicate that he will plead guilty to the one-count criminal Information,” a Justice Department spokesman said in a statement. The news was first reported by The New York Times.
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The Department of Justice assigned the case to U.S. District Court Judge Robert Conrad in the Western District of North Carolina, a George W. Bush appointee.
In a charge filed with the court, the U.S. attorney accused Petraeus of possessing “documents and materials containing classified information of the United States” and “unlawfully and knowingly remov[ing] such documents and materials without authority and with the intent to retain such documents and materials at unauthorized locations.”
In a signed statement, the retired general admitted to making false statements to the FBI about providing classified information to Broadwell.
Key to the investigation are a set of notebooks Petraeus kept during his time as commander of U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan, beginning in June 2010. These “Black Books,” court documents alleged, encompassed the entire period of Petraeus’ Afghan command and contained a wide variety of top-secret information, including the identity of covert officers and details of discussions with the president.
On Aug. 4, 2011, after Petraeus had returned permanently from Afghanistan, he told Broadwell about the Black Books, which remained in his possession. He told her, “They’re in a rucksack up there somewhere” and when Broadwell alluded to the content of the notebooks, Petraeus responded, “they are highly classified, some of them … there’s code word stuff in there.”
Then, on Aug. 27, Petraeus told Broadwell in an email that she could see the Black Books. He brought them to a private residence where Broadwell was staying in D.C. sometime around Aug. 28, and then retrieved them from her a few days later, returning them to a non-secure area of his home in Arlington, Virginia.
Court documents state that no classified information ultimately made it into the book.
In the meantime, from mid-2009 through mid-2012, a Department of Defense historian was tasked with gathering and organizing all of the classified documents that Petraeus had amassed during his leadership within the Department. Petraeus never supplied the Black Books to the historian and the historian stopped gathering materials after his collection was transferred to National Defense University for storage in September 2012.
In October 2012, shortly before Petraeus resigned as CIA director, he told FBI special agents in his Langley, Va. office that he had never provided any classified information to Broadwell. Court documents stipulate that this statement was false.
After Petraeus resigned from the CIA, he signed an exit form saying, “I give my assurance that there is no classified material in my possession,” which court documents say was untrue.
The Black Books remained in Petraeus’ possession until they were seized on April 5, 2013, as the FBI executed a search warrant. They were found in an unlocked desk drawer at Petraeus’ home.
Federal investigators originally uncovered Petraeus’ affair and security breach during a separate investigation into the emails of Tampa, Florida socialite Jill Kelley, an acquaintance of Petraeus from his days as CENTCOM commander.
The investigation revealed that Broadwell had sent emails warning Kelley to stay away from Petraeus. Further, federal officials found that Broadwell possessed classified information, apparently obtained while researching her book “All In: The Education of General David Petraeus,” published in January 2012.
Petraeus resigned his position as CIA director in 2012, just after President Obama’s reelection. At the time, the president said at a news conference after the announcement that he hoped the incident “ends up being a single sidenote on what has otherwise been an extraordinary career.”
Later, as the executive branch recommended pressing charges against Petraeus for the breach, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) wrote to Attorney General Eric Holder on Petraeus’ behalf in late 2014. “Congress and the American people cannot afford to have his voice silenced or curtailed by the shadow of a long-running, unresolved investigation marked by leaks from anonymous sources,” McCain wrote.
The deal struck between Petraeus and the Justice Department would save Petraeus from the scrutiny of a public trial where details of his personal life and affair would be made public. He remains married to Holly Petraeus.
Since leaving his post at the CIA, Petraeus has worked as a partner at Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and has taught at multiple universities.
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