David Letterman reveals affairs, extortion attempt to audience

Image by nickhall via Flickr

On Thursday night's Late Show, comedian David Letterman told his audience and millions of viewers at home, that he was the victim of an extortion attempt over sexual encounters he had with female staffers.

The late night chat show host said that about three weeks ago, he got into his car the go to work and found a package containing a note threatening to make the hookups public unless Letterman paid $2 million. The package also reportedly contained evidence to back up the extortionist's threat, although Letterman did not say what that evidence was.

Rather than give in to threats of having his private sex-capades made public, Letterman contacted the Manhattan District Attorney's office, which launched an investigation and gave Dave a phony check to hand over to the alleged scumbag. The sting resulted in the arrest of 51-year-old Robert Halderman, a producer for CBS's 48 Hours.

Letterman told Thursday's audience that he had spent the morning testifying before a grand jury in the case. The audience, thinking this was just another bit, laughed at times, to the bewilderment of the comic.

One of the hardest lessons I've learned in life is that even good guys do stupid things and when they get caught, they lie about it. Cheating on your spouse/long-time lover and abusing your position to get a little strange on the side is a shitty thing to do. Dave could have lied about his philandering, like Bill Clinton did and it would have all come out anyway. Instead he decided to fess up now and accept the consequences.

It restores my faith in America to know that even a lying, cheating, old horn-dog like Letterman can show a little class, when forced to do so by an extortionist.

Video via TMZ.com.