NORWALK, Conn. — “Late Show” host David Letterman felt “threatened, alarmed and concerned” about damage to his family and career when CBS News journalist Robert “Joe” Halderman threatened to expose his ongoing affair with Halderman’s live-in lover, court records unsealed today revealed.
Halderman told Letterman in a “demand letter” dropped off in the funnyman’s limo last month that “he needs to ‘make a large chunk of money’ by selling Letterman evidence of his affair with “Late Show” staffer Stephanie Birkitt, which Halderman had attached to that letter, records reveal.
SEARCH WARRANT FOR HALDERMAN’S HOUSE
SEARCH WARRANT FOR HALDERMAN’S CAR
The records includes affidavits filed by a Norwalk, Conn., police detective and an NYPD detective filed in support of a warrant to search Halderman’s Norwalk home and his 2006 Honda Accord on Oct. 1.
When cops that day searched that home – which Birkitt had recently moved out of – they seized, among other items, a New York magazine issue featuring Letterman on the cover, records said.
The search warrants and affidavits were unsealed today at a hearing in Norwalk Superior Court, where Judge Bruce Hudock agreed with a lawyer for The Post that the documents should be made public, over the objections of a local prosecutor. Hudock, however, ordered that certain names be redacted from the document, including what appears to have been Birkitt’s name, and at least one other name,
Letterman is referred to as “Client-1” in the affidavits.
The affidavits state that on Sept. 9 Halderman also left in Letterman’s limo a “so-called screenplay treatment” which “refers to Client-1’s [Letterman’s] great professional success,” according to the court records.
“The document then describes that Client-1’s ‘world is about to collapse around him,’ as information about his private life is disclosed leading to a ‘ruined reputation’ and severe damage to his career and family life,” the records state.
“The letter further states that Halderman has a ‘lot more documents ostensibly establishing the truth of the story outline in the screenplay treatment, including ‘more letters, emails, [redacted] and more photos,” the records state.
Included among the materials were “portions of a diary and personal correspondance belonging to [redacted],” the affidavits said. Sources previously have said that that diary and correspondance belonged to Birkitt, and detailed her affair with her boss, Letterman.
Letterman’s lawyer later told New York authorities that his client “feels threatened, alarmed and concerned about the impact of the disclosure of his personal information to his family and career,” according to the affidavit.
Halderman told Letterman’s lawyer, James Jackoway, in several subsequent meetings in New York that he wanted to be paid $2 million “to ensure that the information in the screenplay treatment and supporting materials would not be made public,” the affidavits said.
Halderman received a check for that amount from Jackoway on Sept. 30. He was arrested the next day in New York, and charged with blackmailing Letterman, who disclosed the case and arrest in a stunning “Late Show” monologue that night.
Letterman also disclosed that he had had affairs with multiple female staffers.