Whitney Houston paid off a woman who blackmailed her about her love life, it's been revealed in FBI documents.
Apparently Whitney was the subject of an alleged extortion plot at the height of her fame when an unnamed blackmailer threatened to reveal 'intimate details' about her personal life unless she was paid $100,000, according to files released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The 128 page record, made public after a freedom of information request from God knows who, reveals that Whitney and her father John Houston received a letter from a Chicago-based lawyer in November 1992 stating that his client planned to 'reveal certain details of Whitney's private life ... to several publications' unless paid off. The figure was later upped to $250,000.
Whitney contacted the FBI and when questioned, the lawyer told a federal agent that his client 'has knowledge of intimate details regarding Whitney Houston's romantic relationships, and will go public with the information' if the demands weren't met. And the worst part of all this? When later meeting with an FBI agent herself, Whitney claimed her blackmailer was 'a friend ... who would never do anything to embarrass her'. Or clearly would seeing as the extortion attempt was successful, with the records showing an unsubstantiated amount of money being paid to the woman, who signed a confidentiality agreement that was also found among the records.
The documents, which cover 11 years of federal investigations regarding the singer between 1988 and 1999, also chronicle threatening letters from obsessive fans. So who knows how close to real life The Bodyguard actually was.
