FBI Agent in Petraeus scandal named as Frederick W. Humphries II

The New York Times has identified the FBI Agent who helped start the investigation that ended up bringing down CIA Director David Petraeus as Frederick W. Humphries II.

Humphries, 47, is described by colleagues as a “hard-charging” veteran counterterrorism investigator. 

“Fred is a passionate kind of guy,” one former colleague told the Times. “He’s kind of an obsessive type. If he locked his teeth onto something, he’d be a bulldog.”

Humphries became involved in the scandal after friend and Tampa socialite Jill Kelley told him about some anonoymous threatening emails she had received accusing her of being inappropriately close to Petraeus.

The emails ended up coming from Paula Broadwell, an Army reservist and writer, who was having an affair with Petraeus.

Lawrence Berger, a lawyer for the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, told New York Magazine that Humphries passed the information on to supervisors but was not assigned to the case.

"No one tries to become a whistle-blower," Berger said. "Consistent with FBI policy, he referred it to the proper component."

Reports emerged that Humphries, then unnamed, was getting too close to the case and had become "obsessed". It circulated that Humphries had sent a shirtless photo of himself to Kelley.

But according to Berger, Humphries had sent the shirless email as a joke, reports POLITICO.

“That picture was sent years before Ms. Kelley contacted him about this, and it was sent as part of a larger context of what I would call social relations in which the families would exchange numerous photos of each other,” Berger told the Times.

Humphries remained involved in the investigation by contacting Rep. Dave Reichert, a Republican from Washington state, to tell him about the case. Humphries reportedly thought the investigation was being stalled for political reasons. It was late October and the presidential election was looming.

It's unclear whether Humphries had a personal releationship with Rep. Reichert but Humphries had lived in Washington as a child. Rep. Reichert then put him in touch with House majority leader Eric Cantor who then told FBI director Robert Mueller.

According to the Seattle Times, which published a profile of Humphries in 1999, he grew up in Steilacoom, Wash., went to high school in Canada and afterward joined the US Army. After becoming a captain in military intelligence he went back to school to the University of Tampa and studied criminology.