DS-K: POS

I always figured Dominique Strauss-Kahn was a wrong'un, but like the O.J.Simpson trial, it was apparent from the start that the US judicial system is susceptible to money and media influence.  In the DS-K case, that involved a lot of French media pressure to the effect that their boy did no wrong. DSK’s legal strategy, which did dispute the events other than the housekeeper’s willingness to participate, meant that the case rested largely on his credibility, and that of his accuser. The case began to fall apart after prosecutors cast serious doubt on Diallo, her story, and her truthfulness. Neither of the legal teams concentrated on the DSK's behaviour.

But now it turns out that the boot is on the other foot (I have substituted a condom-related aphorism there, but good taste dictates otherwise.  As luck would have it the French police were investigating a pimping racket based on the Hotel Carlton in Lille, implicating a senior police officer, barrister and local businessman when whose name should pop up but that of the former grand fromage at the IMF.

How was this redoubtable public servant implicated?  Just the small matter of having women brought to him not only in Paris but also in Washington.  One of the young ladies involved, a Belgian in her 30s, known as Jade, told the French newspaper, Nord Eclair, she was taken to Washington for an encounter with Strauss-Kahn in a hotel in January 2010. She was paid by businessmen on her return to France. She said Strauss-Kahn showed her around the IMF building the next day and posed for a photograph with her in his office. It seems that somewhere there must be some incriminating evidence if the NY Attorney General wants to reconsider the previous case.

The businessman in the case said he paid for flights and costs. He is believed to have spent thousands of euros of company money on organising soirées for Strauss-Kahn, putting receipts marked with the initials DSK through his expense accounts, but Strauss-Kahn had not paid for anything. Investigators might like to check that out, and the folks back at the IMF might like to check whether Mr Strauss-Kahn registered such lavish hospitality.

Most intriguingly, one of these encounters took place in New York the night before the perv tried to hump the cleanup maid. The one point in DS-K's NY case that might now work in his favour is that he can now claim that it was an honest mistake, and he thought the bill had been settled by someone else.