Meet the Woman at the center of the David Letterman Extortion Scheme

More juicy details have emerged about late night TV host David Letterman’s admittedly “creepy” sexual trysts with his show staffers and, from the looks of it, the funny guy has to be on his wife’s shit list.

Letterman admitted on “Late Show” Thursday night that he had been the victim of a $2 million blackmail plot that threatened to reveal his sexual escapades to the world. The plot was allegedly masterminded by Emmy award-winning CBS news producer identified by most outlets as Robert Joe Halderman, who, until recently, had lived with one of Letterman’s ex-flames. The esteemed producer of, ironically,  ”48 Hours Mystery,” was charged with one count of attempted larceny sometime last month by Manhattan prosecutors after he deposited a fake $2 million check in a Connecticut bank.

Halderman, 51, had sent Letterman, 62, “a one-page screenplay treatment depicting the talk-show host as a great success whose “world is about to collapse around him” with revelations of his trysts,” according to the New York Times. (The paper, btw, identifies the suspect as Robert Joel Halderman, who is known as “Joe.”)

Oh, yes he did.

Halderman handed over to Letterman photos, letters and a page from their one-time girlfriend’s diary to bolster his “screenplay.”

From the get-go, Letterman was “frightened, scared” and immediately turned to his lawyer, Jim Jackoway, The Times reported quoting unnamed sources.

The woman whose diary became the genesis for the blackmail plot is one Stephanie Birkitt, 34, Letterman’s former personal assistant who also performed segments on his show. Birkitt, who interned on the “Late Show” in 1996 while a student at Wake Forrest University, recently ended her live-in relationship with the alleged extortionist.

Birkitt, a native of Plymouth, New Hampshire, is reportedly “mortified” that her bidness with Letterman was revealed by her another ex-boyfriend.

Here’s Birkitt dancing at Dave’s request last year. He totally gets a kick out of her dancing and asks about her ex-boyfriend. Check it out.

When Birkitt graduated from college in 1997, she was accepted into the CBS page program and worked for “Late Show” and ”48 Hours,” where she was named associate producer. She soon realized she wanted to entertain more than inform, she told her hometown paper.
“I heard there was a job in Dave’s office opening up and I applied, because I didn’t think I was much of a news hound, as it was a little too serious for my personality,” she told the Manchester, N.H., Union Leader  in 2004.

We developed some sort of a phone rapport, just like we get along in real life,” Birkitt told the paper. ”He teases me and gives me a hard time and I’ll give it back, but overall, he’s super nice.”

Halderman’s overwhelming debt due to his 2004 divorce may have been the catalyst behind the alleged scheme.

He earned $214,000 a year, but his salary, assets and debts became part of a dispute he had with ex-wife Patty Montet about alimony, according to documents filed in Stamford Superior Court in 2007, The New York Times reported. He ended up shelling nearly $7,000 a month to his ex-wife, the paper said.

Halderman’s lawyer, Gerald L. Shargel, said his client denied wrongdoing.

“He pled not guilty, and he stands by that plea,” Mr. Shargel said. “My position is that, even upon a superficial glance, there is another side of this story and I’m working on it.”

This story feels like an bloomin’ onion with new blooms popping up strands every day. Take  a New York Post piece that appeared on Sunday, which claims Letterman had a lair in his very private office.

The “skirt-chasing funnyman” restricted the officer to all but some special staffers, sources told the paper. His Midtown studio has all the goods including a fold-out couch and a kitchen, The Post has learned.

“It’s off limits to pretty much everybody,” a “Late Show” insider told The Post yesterday.

Letterman is known to come and go from the crash pad at all hours.

“If he is having an affair or fooling around with somebody at work, she wouldn’t be noticed coming in or out, or seen as something strange because she works there.”

Story has what we in the biz call “legs.” Stay tuned.

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