Ex-IMF Chief To Go Free As Prosecutors Drop Case, Say Maid’s Story Doesn’t Add Up – With Video
Aug 22, 2011 6 Comments ›› Pat Dollard
Prosecutors have filed a motion to dismiss charges against Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who was believed to be a top French presidential contender until he was accused of sexually assaulting a Manhattan hotel maid.
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The development comes more than three months after the former head of the International Monetary Fund was arrested, and more than seven weeks after a judge released him from house arrest as investigators admitted they had discovered significant problems with the credibility of the maid.
“The physical, scientific and other evidence establishes that the defendant engaged in a hurried sexual encounter with the complainant, but it does not independently establish her claim of a forcible, nonconsensual encounter,” the motion says.
The accuser, who came forward late last month and identified herself as Nafissatou Diallo, met with prosecutors briefly Monday as the motion was filed. Her attorney, Ken Thompson, has said she was not treated fairly and that the DA bungled the case.
Thompson said after the motion was filed that Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. has “turned his back” on the accuser and the evidence.
Strauss-Kahn’s lawyers, William Taylor and Benjamin Brafman, said in a statement that their client and his family “are grateful that the district attorney’s office took our concerns seriously and concluded on its own that this case cannot proceed further.”
Strauss-Kahn is due in court on Tuesday, where a judge is expected to officially grant the prosecution’s request and dismiss the case. There was no immediate comment from the DA.
Diallo said at a recent rally that she has cried every day since her encounter with Strauss-Kahn.
“What happened to me, I don’t want that to happen to any other woman,” she said.
Prosecutors said last month that they discovered she had lied about parts of her past, as well as her actions on the day of the encounter, May 14.
The case against the French diplomat upended politics in his home country, where he was a likely Socialist candidate for president next year. When he was first arrested, it was widely believed that his
political career was over. Days after he was arraigned, he also resigned as head of the IMF.
The maid’s credibility issues have “caused us to reassess the position… about the strength of the case,” Assistant District Attorney Joan Illuzzi-Orbon said in court last month.
In a letter prosecutors filed with the court on July 1, they detailed some of the issues with the Sofitel Hotel maid, including that she changed her story about what she did right after the alleged
assault.
The woman first claimed, and testified to a grand jury, to have gone down the hallway and waited until Strauss-Kahn left the room, before immediately reporting the incident to her supervisor. Prosecutors said in the letter that she “has since admitted that this account was false.”
After the incident, the letter said, she proceeded to clean another room and then returned to Strauss-Kahn’s room to clean it before then going to report the incident.
The letter also discussed inconsistencies on the maid’s application for asylum from Guinea, where she is from. The lies, which were made under penalty of perjury, could expose her to federal charges.
In the asylum application, and to prosecutors, the maid claimed her family was persecuted and harassed by Guinea’s dictatorial regime, and that police and government soldiers had destroyed her home and beaten her and her husband.
She later admitted to prosecutors that the information was a lie, the letter said.
The letter also suggested that she falsely claimed to have been gang raped in Guinea.
The maid’s attorney has insisted that evidence still shows the woman was attacked by Strauss-Kahn, including her ripped stockings and DNA evidence on her clothing that matched a sample from him.
Thompson on Monday separately filed a motion to disqualify the Manhattan DA’s office from handling the case, asking that a special prosecutor be appointed. He argued that the DA has “sabotaged” the prosecution, leaked false statements about the maid to the press and subjected her “to verbal abuse and outright disrespect.”
The motion quotes a prosecutor telling the maid’s attorney in June that “no one with half a brain would ever put her on the stand,” and alleges a member of the prosecution team “repeatedly screamed at and outright disrespected her.”
“In short, the DA has demonstrated clear bias and prejudice and this court respectfully should appoint a special prosecutor to restore the confidence in prosecution of this matter,” the motion says
