Bruce Springsteen and his wife, Patti, on 9/4/07. Credit: WENN.com

We’ve heard all sorts of stories about how Bruce Springsteen was supposedly cheating on his wife of 16 years, Patti Scialfa, with a New Jersey woman named Ann Kelly who is currently divorcing her husband. Springsteen was named as the other party in divorce papers filed by Kelly’s husband, a charge both Springsteen and Ann Kelly deny. Kelly knows Springsteen from two different gyms where they have both worked out over the years, but her dad told the NY Daily News she has only a friendly relationship with the rock star.

According to the latest issue of the National Enquirer, Kelly isn’t a friend of Springsteen at all and is more like a rabid fan who won’t leave him alone. They claim Springsteen “barely knows her” and is “freaked out” by this allegation from a woman who “stalked and pestered him” for years.

Bruce Springsteen… was recently named as the “other man” in a New Jersey couple’s divorce, but a source close to Bruce claims the woman involved hounded The Boss for years!

“The wife stalked Bruce and pestered him, but he didn’t have an affair with her. He’s freaked out that he was named in her divorce because he barely knows her,” a music insider told The Enquirer.

“This is a classic case of someone taking advantage of Bruce just because he’s famous.”…

The source maintains Ann Kelly avidly pursued the 59-year-old musician. “When Bruce was a member at The Atlantic [fitness] Club in Red Bank, this woman would manage to ‘run into’ him when he was working out and start chatting him up like they were old friends,” said the insider.

“When Bruce moved to Gold’s Gym in Long Branch, she suddenly began showing up there, as well.”

Ann Kelly also pursued Springsteen at the Chapel Beach Club in Sea Bright, N.J., where he relaxed alone in a cabana during the summer, said the source.

[From The National Enquirer, print edition, April 27, 2009]

If this is true, you can see how Ann Kelly’s husband would assume she’s having an affair with Springsteen. She may have talked about him constantly and acted like she was going to see him when she was just trying to find him. I hope for Bruce’s sake he’s absolved of these cheating claims if this is just a case of an obsessed fan. A lot of people were willing to believe he was responsible since he hooked up with Patti when he was still married to his first wife and was accused of cheating on Patti three years ago with a 9/11 widow he met at a fundraiser – who also happened to be a hot redhead like his wife. Springsteen denied that he was cheating back then and he’s still with Patti. We’ll have to see how this unfolds but I tend to believe the Enquirer and both Springsteen and this woman’s denial. Maybe this stalker even dyed her hair red because she knows that’s his preference.