The multimillionaire CEO of Overstock.com engaged in a sexual relationship with Russian spy Maria Butina with the encouragement of the FBI but did not follow their directions when they told him to rekindle it, he has claimed.
Patrick Byrne met Butina for the first time at FreedomFest, an annual libertarian convention in Las Vegas, in July 2015. He told the Washington Examiner that Butina approached him after his keynote speech, telling him she was the leader of a gun rights organization in Russia, but he “brushed her off.” Butina later approached him again and said she worked for a top official at the Central Bank of Russia and invited him to speak there.
By his account, the 57-year-old CEO, who said he holds a low-level security clearance, reported the contact with Butina, 30, to the U.S. government. The FBI then gave him a “green light” to get to know Butina. The two began a romantic relationship, which ended in March 2016. Four months later, he said, the FBI asked him to rekindle the relationship with Butina.
This Maria Butina is no Anna Chapman. The Ruskies must be having a rough time recruiting top quality human assets . . . or rather humans with top quality assets.