Comedienne's Second TV Show Canceled This Year
'Red Widow' Gets The Axe
Meet Robert Halderman, Letterman's blackmailer
by Danny Gallagher, posted Oct 3rd 2009 9:00AM
So just who had the unbelievably huge Mammoth balls to extort late night legend David Letterman? You're looking at him, not his balls thankfully. Robert "Joe" Halderman, pictured at the right sitting in his unholy beach chair of evil, is the man the Manhattan District Attorney's Office brought extortion charges against for trying to score more than $2 million from Letterman as part of a blackmail plot.
Letterman admitted on the air that he had a sexual encounter or encounters with members of his staff, and that Halderman used the info he had on those encounters as leverage to extort money from him. I've got three to one odds that the "Fire David Letterman" club awards Halderman their "Humanitarian of the Year Award."
According to New York City's Department of Correction records, Halderman received a felony count of attempted grand larceny. He entered a not-guilty plea at his arraignment.
Prosecutors claim he tried to blackmail Letterman by threatening to write a screenplay treatment on his tryst with one of his staff members, specifically Stephanie Birkitt, better known as Vicki the prize girl who always calls Letterman "Mr. Carny" during the "Know Your Current Events" segments. What she called him when they were together is nobody's business.
Birkitt was dating Halderman at the time of the extortion scheme. Letterman and Birkitt met just after Letterman's divorce 15 years ago. She wasn't part of the scheme, and representatives of the former staff member told Radar Online that she was "mortified" that Halderman would attempt such a thing.
And here's the most ironic part: Halderman is a producer for CBS' weekly crime magazine 48 Hours. Talk about taking your work home with you!
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