McGreeveys respond to 3-way sex claims

TRENTON, N.J. - His estranged wife denies it, but former New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey said they engaged in threesomes with a male aide.

In an e-mail to the Associated Press today, McGreevey confirmed published reports by former campaign aide Teddy Pedersen. Pedersen said he had consensual sex with the couple for about two years before McGreevey became governor.

McGreevey said the encounters happened, but the couple needs to move forward for the sake of their 6-year-old daughter.

"This happened, this happened in the past, and now we need to move on with our lives," McGreevey said.

Dina Matos McGreevey said Pedersen's published claims are "completely false" and were prompted by the nation's first openly gay governor as a way to discredit her.

The McGreeveys are in the midst of an acrimonious divorce. She accuses him of hiding his homosexuality before and during their marriage and has sued for damages. He has said she should have known he was gay.

Pedersen, McGreevey's former driver and traveling aide, Pedersen said he came forward because he was angry that Matos McGreevey was offering television commentary - in which she said she was blindsided when her husband announced his homosexuality - on the resignation of New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, who was embroiled in a sex scandal with a call girl.

Pedersendetailed multiple trysts in interviews yesterday with the Star-Ledger of Newark and the New York Post. He disputes claims by Dina Matos McGreevey that she did not know about her husband's homosexuality when she married him in October 2000.

The 29-year-old real estate developer told the newspapers that the threesomes started in 1999 while McGreevey was mayor of Woodbridge, N.J., and McGreevey and Dina were dating. He said they stopped when McGreevey was elected governor in 2001.

He said he only had contact with her during the trysts, and wasn't sure whether McGreevey was gay.

"In hindsight, there might have been light interest [in me]," Pedersen told the Star-Ledger, "but it didn't seem like he was gay. It did enhance their sexual relationship having me be a part of it."

Jim McGreevey resigned in 2004 after acknowledging an affair with a male staffer who he said was trying to blackmail him. The ex-staffer said he was sexually harassed by the Democratic governor.

The McGreeveys separated shortly after McGreevey's nationally televised speech, in which he declared himself "a gay American."

In her book, Silent Partner, Matos McGreevey says she missed the signs that her husband preferred men. She says she didn't learn of his homosexuality until shortly before he announced to the nation that he was "a gay American" and would resign.

Pedersen's name surfaced recently as part of the McGreeveys' contentious divorce proceedings, with Matos McGreevey asking whether Pedersen's trip to China last summer, in which he accompanied McGreevey and his boyfriend, Mark O'Donnell, was paid for out of a bank account the former governor and his partner share.

Pedersen told the newspapers he gave a sworn deposition about the sexual liaisons and expects to be called as a witness in the divorce trial.

In her book, Matos McGreevey refers to Pedersen as a close acquaintance but someone she didn't always want around. On a trip to Canada during which she expected McGreevey to pop the marriage question, she insisted that Pedersen stay behind.