In an interview published Tuesday, the Tampa, Fla. socialite swept up in the David Petraeus scandal said that Paula Broadwell tried to blackmail her.
Jill Kelley told The Daily Beast’s Howard Kurtz that she has never met Broadwell and that the two were not romantic rivals jockeying for the affection of Petraeus as had been reported by much of the press. Kelley said the vaguely worded emails from Broadwell did not warn her to stay away from Petraeus but “there was blackmail, extortion, threats.” But when asked by federal prosecutors if she wanted to file charges against Broadwell, Kelley declined.
She also emphatically denied that she had maintained an affair with Gen. John Allen and dismissed the claim that she exchanged upwards of 30,000 emails with the U.S. commander in Afghanistan.
