Jimmy Tayoun Recalls The Woman Who Triggered the Petraeus Scandal
By Mark Abrams
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The Florida woman whose complaint of threatening e-mails eventually led to discovery of a scandal involving the CIA director and another top general grew up in our area and was well known to a former Philadelphia city councilman.
Former councilman Jimmy Tayoun, who ran the Middle East Restaurant years ago and is now editor of the Philadelphia Public Record, says he knew Jill Kelley, her sister, and her family, the Khawams, who emigrated from Lebanon to Philadelphia in the 1970s.
Tayoun says her father came to him for a job, and he hired him.
"He came over here legitimately, worked hard, got himself a visa, raised a family, educated them. The girls were tall and beautiful and brainy. God blessed them with both virtues, for which they are now the objects of ridicule," Tayoun tells KYW Newsradio.
And Tayoun says he hasn't had much contact with the Khawam girls, but was getting regular updates from their father after they moved from the area.
Tayoun says he is convinced that Jill and her sister will be vindicated, despite the salacious stories circulating about their now-very-public lives.
