CIA Director David Petraeus testifies before the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on "World Wide Threats" on Jan. 31, 2012.(Photo: Kare Bleier, AFP/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — Former CIA director David Petraeus has reached a plea agreement with the Justice Department, concluding a years-long investigation into his divulging to his mistress secret information, including names of covert officers and war strategy, according to court documents.
The explosive details in the agreement show that Petraeus lied to investigators, divulged a massive amount of sensitive data to Paula Broadwell and worried about how she handled them in an interview she taped with him.
The criminal information filed in federal court in North Carolina states that from August 2011 to April 5, 2013, Petraeus did "unlawfully and knowingly'' remove classified materials and retained them at "unauthorized'' locations.
The plea agreement includes a recommendation of two years probation and a $40,000 fine.
Petraeus declined to comment. An attorney for Petraeus, Robert Barnett, also declined to comment on the plea deal.
In court documents filed in support of the government's case, prosecutors alleged that Petraeus, while commander in Afghanistan, maintained eight so-called black books that contained classified and unclassified notes he took during meetings, conferences and briefings. And in late August 2011, he delivered the books to the private Washington, D.C., residence where Broadwell — his biographer and mistress— was staying during a week-long trip to the area.
"The D.C. private residence was not approved for the storage of classified information,'' the documents state.
Among the mass of sensitive information contained in the books were the "identities of covert officers, war strategy, intelligence capabilities and mechanisms, diplomatic discussions … and deliberative discussions from high-level National Security Council meetings, and discussions with the president of the United States.''
Also contained in the "black books'' was national defense information, including secret code word information.
In a conversation recorded by Broadwell, she asked Petraeus about the whereabouts of the black books, and he acknowledged their sensitivity.
"By the way, where are your black books?'' Broadwell asks Petraeus, according to a transcript of an Aug. 4, 2011, conversation. "Um, well, they're really — I mean they are highly classified, some of them."
Yet, later that month Petraeus sent Broadwell an e-mail in which he "agreed to provide the black books to his biographer'' and left the binders there between Aug. 28 and Sept. 1.
The court documents also state that Petraeus lied to FBI agents Oct. 26, 2012, when they questioned him at CIA headquarters. Asked about his handling of classified information, Petraeus stated that he "had never provided any classified information to his biographer and he had never facilitated the provision of classified information to his biographer.''
"These statements were false,'' the court documents state. "Defendant David Howell Petraeus then and there knew that he previously shared the black books with his biographer.''
After acknowledging the affair and resigning from the CIA in 2012, Petraeus signed an agency "security exit form,'' in which he assured authorities that there was "no classified material in my possession, custody or control at this time.''
"At the time he provided this assurance, the black books were still in the Petraeus residence,'' the court documents state.
A statement from the Justice Department added: "The criminal Information charges the defendant with one count of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1924. 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."
Petraeus was the most lauded general in the post-9/11 era, having devised the counterinsurgency strategy that tamped down violence in Iraq but did not result in creating the conditions he deemed necessary to build an inclusive government. U.S. troops withdrew in 2011, but now 3,000 have returned to advise Iraqi forces battling Islamic State extremists.
Petraeus went on to lead Central Command, which oversees military operations stretching from the Middle East to Afghanistan. President Obama chose him to command of all forces in Afghanistan after Gen. Stanley McChrystal was fired in 2010 after his staff was quoted in Rolling Stone magazine making disparaging remarks about politicians, including Vice President Biden.
It was in Afghanistan that Broadwell, an Army intelligence officer, met and traveled with Petraeus several times for research on her book, All In, the Education of David Petraeus. In 2011 Obama named Petraeus to lead the CIA.
Petraeus, who holds a doctorate from Princeton, has been teaching and advising a venture capital firm in New York.
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