Shirtless FBI agent photo was a joke, not a come-on

The scandal ensnaring former general David Petraeus reveals a lot of bad behavior but one player in this soap opera, FBI agent Frederick W. Humphries II, deserves an apology from hundreds of media outlets across the nation.

It turns out that the shirtless photo of Humphries was an email joke, not an attempt to woo the affections of Jill Kelley, the Tampa socialite who’s a key figure in this controversy.

Photo/Seattle Times

In fact, the photo (above) was sent two years ago and is clearly nothing more than an attempt by Humphries to poke fun at himself. It shows Humphries posing with two gun range targets – bald-headed dummies that bare – I should say bear -- a striking resemblance to the federal agent.

The Seattle Times broke the story after a copy of the email was leaked to the paper. Kelley, a Humphries family friend, was one of the recipients of the email that featured a picture-attachment of Humphries “posing with a couple of dummies,” according to the Times.

A former Army intelligence officer, Humphries was known to send joke emails in which the punch line is delivered when an attached photo is opened.

Humphries, 47, apparently sent the photo to Kelley and others in the fall of 2010, shortly after he had transferred to the FBI’s Tampa office from Guantánamo Bay, where he had served as a liaison for the bureau to the CIA at the detention facility, the Times reported.

Why the FBI never stepped in and straightened out this messy mix of false information, especially after Humphries was identified and became the butt of jokes on late-night TV shows, is incomprehensible.

True, Humphries was not well-liked by some FBI higher-ups because he butted his way into the investigation of Kelley’s emails and went rogue by seeking help for her from two congressmen.

But the reprimand he received for those actions should not have prevented someone from stepping forward when the story, which went viral online days ago, was so obviously wrong.