A close friend of Jared Kushner's who was pardoned by Trump has been charged over claims he used spyware to monitor his then-wife's online activity

• A close friend of Jared Kushner's has been charged with cyberstalking his now ex-wife.
• Kenneth Kurson, a former editor of the Observer, was pardoned by Trump this year for related charges.
• The Manhattan district attorney said Kurson used spyware to access his wife's Gmail and Facebook.

A close friend of Jared Kushner's who was pardoned earlier this year by President Donald Trump was charged with spying on his wife's email and Facebook messages.

The Manhattan district attorney's office said on Wednesday that from September 2015 to March 2016, Kenneth Kurson, 52, monitored the digital activity of his wife at the time. He was charged with eavesdropping and computer trespass. He was arrested on Wednesday, The Washington Post and ABC News reported.

Kurson, the Observer's former editor-in-chief, used spyware to monitor his wife's keystrokes and access her Facebook and Gmail from his office in midtown Manhattan, the DA's statement said.

A complaint said his now ex-wife, who was not named in the DA's statement, had told authorities that Kurson "terrorized her through email and social media causing her problems at work and in her social life," The Post reported.

Kurson's lawyer did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

On January 20, Trump pardoned Kurson for earlier, related charges of cyberstalking three unnamed people, one of whom Kurson believed was responsible for the breakdown of his marriage.

Kurson has close ties with Trumpworld. He co-authored Rudy Giuliani's 2002 bestseller "Leadership," and, according to The New York Times, he was appointed to his news-editor role in 2013 by Kushner, then the Observer Media Group's owner.

Kurson, who worked on one of Trump's speeches, was vetted for a role on the board of the National Endowment for the Humanities in the Trump administration - which led to the FBI's cyberstalking investigation, The Times reported.

Trump's pardon on the last day of his presidency noted Kurson's charity and community work and said Kurson's ex-wife had called for an end to the investigation.

But as soon as Kurson was pardoned at the federal level, the Manhattan DA opened an investigation at the state level.

"We will not accept presidential pardons as get-out-of-jail-free cards for the well-connected in New York," Manhattan DA Cy Vance Jr. said in the Wednesday statement.

"As alleged in the complaint, Mr. Kurson launched a campaign of cybercrime, manipulation, and abuse from his perch at the New York Observer, and now the people of New York will hold him accountable," Vance said, using the former name of the Observer Media Group's flagship newspaper.

Eavesdropping and computer trespass are Class E felonies that can lead to up to four years of probation.