The woman with whom former presidential candidate John Edwards has publicly admitted to having an affair was married for a decade to the son of Boulder’s former district attorney, Alex Hunter.
Edwards, a former North Carolina senator and 2004 Democratic vice-presidential nominee, admitted Friday to ABC News that he had lied repeatedly about the affair with Rielle Hunter, now 44.
Edwards denied, however, fathering the woman’s daughter, Frances Quinn Hunter, who was born Feb. 27.
Before the scandal erupted, the woman â who changed her name from Lisa Druck â was married for 10 years to Alexander “Kip” Munro Hunter III, of Boulder.
Hunter III is an attorney and son of the man who was arguably Boulder’s most famous prosecutor. The senior Hunter gained international attention while leading the JonBenet Ramsey homicide investigation following the 1996 slaying.
His son married Druck in 1991, and the couple moved to a $700,000 bungalow in Beverly Hills.
The Los Angeles County Assessor’s Office on Tuesday confirmed Hunter III owned the property from at least 1994 to 1999.
It was there, in the heart of the movie industry, that Druck started using the stage name Rielle Hunter, and in 1994 she legally adopted that name, which is pronounced “Riley.”
According to the divorce records, she received $5,000 a month for all of 2000 and $4,000 a month for the next year. Then the spousal support ended.
On Tuesday, Hunter III was in Boulder at his 1,300-square-foot, $540,000 condo atop a commercial building in the 800 block of Pearl Street, which Boulder County assessor’s records show he purchased in 2001.
“I hope you can appreciate why I can’t comment,” Hunter III said by phone, declining to talk about his ex-wife.
The senior Hunter did not return phone calls Tuesday.
Unlike his father, Hunter III has kept a relatively low-profile public life.
According to Camera archives, he was briefly thrust into the spotlight as a 21-year-old suspect in connection with shoplifting a $3 bottle of whisky from Boulder’s Liquor Mart in 1980. The charge was dismissed and the case dropped after witnesses to the reported theft could not be located.
Hunter III also received attention in February 1978 when he told Boulder police that a man approached him and a friend while walking in the 1100 block of University Avenue and demanded to see some identification. The man, later identified by witnesses as John Grubesic, reportedly shot Hunter III in the leg with a small-caliber revolver.
Grubesic pleaded no contest to assault and received three years of probation and one year in jail.
At about the same time, the younger Hunter’s then-future wife was living an often high-profile life, from the New York City literary party world of the¤’80s to Hollywood in the¤’90s to this decade’s boutique spiritual retreats.
She was born in Fort Lauderdale and left Florida in 1984 after being enrolled at the University of Tampa for two years. By 1987, she had ended up in the hard-partying New York circle of novelist Jay McInerney.
McInerney, whose books portrayed the cocaine-fueled atmosphere of New York City in the 1980s, based his third novel, “Story of My Life,” on his time with Druck and their friends. One character, Alison Poole, was specifically modeled after her, McInerney said in a 2005 magazine article. He said that she had “intrigued and appalled” him.
The story, in Breathe Magazine, was primarily a transcript of a discussion between Rielle Hunter and McInerney following their reunion in Manhattan that year.
“For me you’re a little bit frozen in time, a little bit Alison Poole, the 21-year-old party girl in that book who runs around New York going to nightclubs, doing drugs and abusing credit cards,” McInerney said.
She replies that she did a lot of drugs but adds that she was struck by her character’s “need for truth.”
“That’s definitely a theme in my life â seeker of truth,” she tells him.
Hunter tells him that she moved to Los Angeles to become an actress and to get away from the drug scene in New York.
She said she got off drugs in California with the help of a healer.
After the divorce with Hunter III, she attended spiritual retreats and experienced an awakening that was so startling that it took her breath away, then left her unable to leave the house for weeks, she told McInerney.
She started a foundation promoting higher consciousness and set up a Web site, beingisfree.org, but it was taken down soon after the first National Enquirer article on the Edwards affair was published.
In 2006, Edwards’ political action committee paid $100,000 in a four-month span to a newly formed company run by Rielle Hunter, who directed the production of four Web videos showing Edwards in supposedly candid moments as well as in a public speech talking about morality.
The Associated Press and the Raleigh News & Observer contributed to this report.
This information, except for the stupid property assessments, has been on the news and internet for days. What took the camera so long?
flintonx2
8/12/2008 7:46:38 PM
Is the Daily Camera this desperate to attach Boulder to national news?
WHO CARES!?The news is the relationship between Edwards and Rielle Hunter
crazy4cheese
8/12/2008 8:36:02 PM
WHO CARES?
Manioca35
8/12/2008 9:55:03 PM
Everything revolves around Boulder, doesn’t it? Everything…
Danimal
8/12/2008 9:59:53 PM
I don’t recall seeing anything in the Camera about 35 articles of impeachment introduced by Kucinich.But you spill ink about this instead?
patriot007
8/12/2008 10:10:50 PM
Six Degrees Of Boulder
MisterPist
8/13/2008 5:21:37 AM
Boulder is full of these morons.Just another day in the life…
syntrade@earthlink.net
8/13/2008 7:37:52 AM
These kinds of things happen outside of Boulder.
monkeys
8/13/2008 7:59:57 AM
way too much angst…like you need something to vent at because your own lives are out of control.
DC posts this because it’s news that has _some_ link to Boulder.Doesn’t matter how, or if it’s really important for that matter, but DC is Boulder’s news source.If there’s a Boulder link, or it happens here, it gets posted.
You, on the other hand, are only here to promote your anger/jealousy of our home.I believe the Onion just profiled you on their front page last week –
“Local Idiot to Post Comment on Internet”
Well – you made them proud because you actually followed through.
Lurking and taking pot shots at our paper and our people is a sign that you just really have a useless and unfulfilling life.Go outside and get one, instead of wasting your time filling up these comment boards with useless trash.Bozo.
MuddyOne
8/13/2008 8:01:12 AM
You know, the Denver media does this all the time.”Such-and-such has a Denver connection, as the daughter’s friend’s sister is a co-worker…” kind of thing.And they do it because they have this overwhelming need to pretend they don’t live in a cow-town, so they try to portray Denver as a “world class” city.Which it is not.
DC, we don’t need to do that with Boulder.
bobmobber@hotmail.com
8/13/2008 8:03:06 AM
It’s a paper that covers Boulder.Let them cover Boulder.
MK_Love
8/13/2008 8:07:23 AM
What nobody wants to address is the fact that those towers of journalism, The New York Times, Washington Post and L.A. Times did not break this story. They were scooped by the National Enquirer!
The rumors had been around for many years, but since those papers have their own liberal agenda, they chose to ignore them, not investigate them. Their hypocrisy is now obvious to the world.
chartguy
8/13/2008 8:15:13 AM
And where does Kevin Bacon fit into all this?
Dunkterfunk
8/13/2008 8:46:31 AM
The DC just tried to localize a national story. Give them credit for doing that.
ComNSense
8/13/2008 9:40:53 AM
I believe Alex Hunter (71) also has three children in their 20’s.I met him and the toddler kids in the late 80’s, assuming they were his.Perhaps they were grandkids, but I don’t think so.Since this is a story of sordid gossip, especially including Hunter’s connection to the Ramsey case, it is perfect for Boulder.
Is the son who was married to Edward’s mistress also a “love child” of Hunter’s?
helloland
8/13/2008 10:06:58 AM
Maybe Rielle knows who killed Jon Bonet….. and, maybe she told Edwards during an advanced class in elementary biology.
driveby_poster
8/13/2008 10:25:16 AM
Synopsis:
The woman is pretty much a kook. Hunter III has class and wishes to be left alone. Edwards is a rich, powerful, and incredibly stupid man, a la Elliot Spitzer. This is not “news.”
inmyriver
8/13/2008 10:28:16 AM
Boulder, Colorado, Center of the Universe, All Roads Lead to Boulder!!!
Good Job, Heath, on expanding the story. We Boulderites do revel in a tad of juicy gossip pointed our way.
BoulderConfidential
8/13/2008 10:50:14 AM
Kip, I told you that chick was crazy.
dont@bugmenot.com
8/13/2008 12:51:31 PM
Maybe this should be in the entertainment section…
apricot_tea
8/13/2008 12:57:29 PM
This certainly is important breaking news!Thank you DC!Wait… why is this important again?Oh, yeah.It’s a way to keep the story in the paper a day longer.Gimme a break.
brad@boulderwineblog.com
8/13/2008 1:50:56 PM
“On Tuesday, Hunter III was in Boulder at his 1,300-square-foot, $540,000 condo atop a commercial building in the 800 block of Pearl Street, which Boulder County assessor’s records show he purchased in 2001.”
Why on earth does this story include useless infoporn like the square footage, purchase price, & date of purchase of the condo of the ex-husband of the woman that slept with Edwards?
Why stop there?
Can you get his gradeschool report cards?
Has he ever filed for a permit to remove asbestos?
How many pounds of trash does he put in the dumpster each day?
Does he have incandescent or flourescent bulbs, and what is the wattage for each?
Boxers or briefs?
…Beyond the fact that this guy was previously married to this woman, and he’s related to Alex Hunter, who cares?
Nativeofboulder
8/13/2008 2:03:28 PM
Hey muddyone, you said:
“Lurking and taking pot shots at our paper and our people is a sign that you just really have a useless and unfulfilling life. Go outside and get one, instead of wasting your time filling up these comment boards with useless trash. Bozo.”
…whereas your comment was useful and precious?
I think the negative response to this article is understandable.
Making the connection to Boulder seems like fair game to me, but including extraneous info from the property tax records is just plain stupid.
What is the purpose?
Nativeofboulder
8/13/2008 2:14:33 PM
who changes their name to Rielle?? the totally ridiculous part is that she says its pronounced “riley”..yeah right! then why isnt it spelled “riley” REEE-elle….and then the whole deal about a “spiritual awakening” yeah whatever, i seen her picture, she’s covered in jewelry…she’s rich and bangin a politician, my shoe lace has more of a spiritual side than name-chagin’ Reeee-elle.
sfld1
8/13/2008 2:19:42 PM
“In 2006, Edwards’ political action committee paid $100,000 in a four-month span to a newly formed company run by Rielle Hunter, who directed the production of four Web videos showing Edwards in supposedly candid moments as well as in a public speech talking about morality.”
…ohhhh, the smacking irony!(thanks DC, I enjoyed this particular detail)
Nativeofboulder
8/13/2008 2:22:05 PM
The most important questions have yet to be asked.
What will happen to John Edwards hair? Who will get custody? And will Edwards’ hair live in Boulder?
theprairieprankster
8/13/2008 3:01:10 PM
Posted by Dunkterfunk on August 13, 2008 at 8:46 a.m.
“And where does Kevin Bacon fit into all this?”
That’s easy; John Edwards has a Bacon Number of 1:
Tailgunner_Joe
8/13/2008 3:25:21 PM
Sure, Edwards might make a creep of a husband, but that’s between him and his family.Other than the fact that he could have ruined the Democratic Party’s chances of winning the presidency had he become the nominee, who really cares?The right wingers are crying hypocrisy, but have they not heard of Jennifer Fitzgerald? http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article484349.ece
brad@boulderwineblog.com
8/13/2008 3:35:59 PM
“I don’t recall seeing anything in the Camera about 35 articles of impeachment introduced by Kucinich. But you spill ink about this instead?”
The Kookcinich-thing is not a Boulder story, and Jennifer Falor has stated the DC mainly does Boulder stories.
driveby_poster
8/13/2008 4:44:30 PM
Well it might at the very least show that being an attorney and having a lifestyle that might put anyone else away for life might go together here in Boulder as well as in the Hollywoods. Not prejudging too much of course because everyone has the right to an expensive attorney, right. By the way just how many attorney’s does it take to sink a country?
cgillard99@gmail.com
8/13/2008 6:09:55 PM
Ok, ok so John Edwards is an attorney too and rich. One thing that helps is if they try to help others like he has and not just help themselves. But some of the angry young law students these days are something else.
When the cost of litigation in almost all areas of life is figured out we have to wonder how our society functions at all.
cgillard99@gmail.com
8/13/2008 6:15:25 PM
So wait..you’re saying that John Edwards killed Jon Benet?
InigoMontoya
8/13/2008 8:21:29 PM
6 degrees of who the f— gives a sh–!
GabeMc
8/13/2008 10:25:19 PM
I bet Kip told Rielle who killed Jon Benet and she would trade her daughter’s DNA for a big dollar payment for that info.
Hear that National Enquirer? Got enough in the spare change tin DC?
BoulderConfidential
8/13/2008 11:01:11 PM
DC: This is gossip, not news.
springerwannab
8/15/2008 12:26:57 PM
They moved into a BUNGALOW??!
andy@dickson.org
8/15/2008 12:38:54 PM
