WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Department of Homeland Security official who ran an investigation of a prostitution scandal involving Secret Service agents in Colombia in 2012 resigned after he was suspected of visiting a prostitute in Florida, the New York Times reported.
Investigator David Nieland left the government in August after refusing to answer questions about the incident, when he was seen coming and going from a building under surveillance in a prostitution investigation, the newspaper reported late on Tuesday, citing current and former DHS officials.
Sheriff's deputies in Broward County, Florida, later interviewed a prostitute who identified Nieland in a photograph and said he had paid her for sex, according to the officials cited by the Times.
A spokesman for the inspector general of the DHS said in a statement he could only confirm that Nieland resigned in August, but added that department officials "became aware in early May of this year of in incident in Florida that involved one of our employees," the newspaper reported.
The Times quoted Nieland as saying in an email: "The allegation is not true," and said he declined to answer any questions.
The DHS inspector general's office and the Broward County Sheriff's office were both investigating, but Nieland had not been charged in connection with the incident, the Times said.
It said he had been at the center of a dispute over whether the Obama administration tried to cover up the involvement of a volunteer member of a White House advance team in the scandal involving eight Secret Service agents in Cartagena, Colombia, ahead of a visit by President Barack Obama in April 2012. The agents were fired after it was found they had prostitutes in their hotel rooms.
(Writing by Eric Walsh; Editing by Peter Cooney)