Conventional wisdom says voters don’t care if their elected officials are cheating wildly on their spouses. Former President Bill Clinton is still wildly popular. Sen. David Vitter (R-Nev.) is still in office. So is Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.), who has perhaps the most stunning comeback story of them all. He left town to have an affair with his Argentinian lover and lied about his whereabouts. He said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. He’s no longer with his wife or his lover, who, for awhile, was his fiancé.
But how about government contractors employed by the State Department and Department of Homeland Security? Would you care if those placed in charge of the $145 million contract with the State Department for processing visas for immigrants were engaged in a torrid affair that contributed to the breakup of two marriages?
In divorce documents obtained by The Mirror, FCI Federal’s top two execs (pictured above) were accused of having an affair by their respective spouses. The president’s wife accused him of having affairs with “various escorts” — a charge he denies. The president admits he had a sexual relationship with his firm’s CEO.
FCI Federal is a government contractor based in Leesburg, Va. with millions in contracts with the State Department, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and Homeland Security. If FCI sounds familiar, there’s good reason. The company is presently battling USIS, the government contractor that vetted Edward Snowden and the Navy Yard shooter in a contract with the FBI. The details of that are pretty messy.
Sharon Virts, a woman named as Miller’s mistress in their respective divorce cases, is FCI’s CEO; Scott Miller is company president. As of late January, each had shared pictures on Facebook of what appeared to be the same vacation spot — it involves green pastures and zebras.
Let’s break down the dirty details.
In March 2013, Kevin Mozer filed for divorce in Loudoun Circuit Court from Sharon Virts. He claimed his wife had “engaged in multiple acts of sexual intercourse and oral sodomy” with Scott Miller on several occasions in February 2013. Mozer sought child support, spousal support, and the couple’s home. He won them all. Although Virts officially filed to divorce Mozer in May, when settlement time came, she gave her ex the home and $300,000 annually for 15 years.
The couple married in McLean, Va. in 1997. They had two sons born two years apart. It’s unclear when the marriage began to falter — they officially separated in 2013 — but Mozer said in his filing that he believed the affair was going on when he sought the divorce. After he learned about his wife’s infidelity, he said he refused to remain in the same home with her.
His filing states, “There is no hope of reconciliation between the parties as a consequence of the Defendant’s outrageous and deceitful conduct.”
In 2014, meanwhile, Scott Miller filed for divorce from his wife, Jean Pacelli, in Fairfax County Circuit Court. The divorce is still pending. In Pacelli’s counterclaim, filed on July 14, 2014, she accused Miller of seeking the services of “various escorts” and Sharon Virts. She also accused him of an “adulterous affair” with a woman named Elaine White.
Pacelli paints a promising but inevitably bleak portrait of their marriage. They wed in 1984 in leafy Chestnut Hill, Pa. They later resided in Reston, Va. They had a boy and girl born seven years apart. In 2012, their 28th year of marriage, things fell apart and the couple separated.
Before that, her counterclaim insisted, she was willing to work things out with Miller despite his affairs as long as he was willing to “recommit to the marriage.” Sadly, she said, he was not.
Miller responded with a counterclaim. He came clean about an “intimate relationship” with White in the mid-90s, about a decade into their marriage. He also admitted a “romantic relationship with Sharon Virts in 2013,” but insisted it happened a year after the couple separated. He denied any shenanigans with escorts. He denied that either of his affairs contributed to the collapse of their marriage.
Miller’s divorce is still pending.
The State Department appears to have an ongoing problem with scandalous sex.
In February, 2015, a 44-year-old Daniel Rosen, a male senior State Department official in charge of counter terrorism and violent extremism, was arrested for soliciting sex from a minor. According to a CBS report, he was was busted after exchanging messages with an undercover detective.
In June, 2014, CBS reported that a U.S. ambassador had solicited a prostitute in a public park. In October, 2014, reports surfaced that State Department managers had stifled the investigation of prostitution solicitation by American diplomats. At the time, GOP lawmakers considered a congressional probe.