Is the Head of the IMF a Sex Criminal?

I don't think there are any winners in this situation. DSK's and the maid's lives have both been damaged by it

May 16, here, below the photo history of IMF Managing Director, his face dark and closed, leaving the police station in Harlem, hands tied behind his back, surrounded by plainclothes police before be thrown in jail, we wrote that, despite the precariousness of the facts alleged against him, Dominique Strauss-Kahn was, "political and media, already held. And punished harshly, without mercy" .

Three months later, the judicial determination of the U.S. component of the case confirms the DSK first to comment, beyond what one could imagine . In ruling for the classification of the record, Monday, August 22, failing to establish with certainty before a jury the credibility of the testimony of the alleged victim, on which only the sexual assault charge, counsel for the State of New York does not totally whitens Strauss-Kahn: It simply recognizes that the inconsistencies revealed during the investigation, in the version of the young woman would not allow him to convince twelve jurors in the good faith of that it beyond a reasonable doubt.

In the absence of witnesses and physical evidence, no one except Mr. Strauss-Kahn and Nafissatou Diallo , will do so if the "sexual rush" held each May 14 in the chamber of the Director of the IMF Sofitel New York, the report said the prosecutor was forced or consented. Finally free to leave the U.S. if the judge follows the recommendation of the prosecutor, Mr. Strauss-Kahn has not been cleared so far.

Such a decision will lead inevitably to France questions about American justice. No doubt we can expect that after this episode, Americans see with new eyes the barbaric practice of "perp walk" , the march of shame for the suspect who was so shocked that the French and even the mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, has finally issued doubts. But overall, the American judicial system, which obeys its own logic, that of the adversarial process has worked.

For Strauss-Kahn, the lesson is, as we said, "ruthless" . The case forced him to leave early, and degrading circumstances, his position as Director of the IMF. It definitely has affected his candidacy for the 2012 presidential election. And she lifted the veil on aspects of his personality, his relationships with women and with the money. Like most French politicians, he felt protected by our strong tradition of respect for privacy.

The media frenzy has undoubtedly played a major role in the fall of DSK. On both sides of the Atlantic, the examples of excesses are not lacking, unfortunately. But essentially, in the end, based on Strauss-Kahn himself. Like Bill Clinton , whose presidency was tarnished by the case of Monica Lewinsky , it is primarily a victim of his own imprudence.

But essentially, in the end, based on Strauss-Kahn himself. Like Bill Clinton , whose presidency was tarnished by the case of Monica Lewinsky , it is primarily a victim of his own imprudence.

He doesn't have a case against either NYC or NYS. This wasn't a malicious prosecution. They had legal probable cause to arrest him and to seek an indictment. And, it was their investigation that resulted in revealing credibility problems with the complainant--info they promptly turned over to the defense. Even though they might have handled it better, they played by the book on this case, and they really aren't liable.

Vance's dropping of the charges is not a vindication of DSK, it does not mean he did not sexually assault the maid, it simply means they could not rely on her credibility to prove the charges against him beyond a reasonable doubt.

Even if he had made a snap decision to have a brief, hurried consensual sexual encounter with a total stranger, don't you see him as having any responsibility for the consequences of that decision on his part--including winding up in a criminal case? Don't you think that split second decisions to have brief sexual contact with total strangers are more than slightly reckless?

So, whether what happened in that hotel room was consensual or criminal, it involved decisions he made--and, either way, it would indicate poor judgment on his part, for not considering possible consequences to himself as a result of what he chose to do--with a total stranger. So, I have a hard time seeing him as some sort of helpless victim. He contributed to his own downfall by whatever he did in that hotel room.

Firefly unlike Clinton we had a woman here lying her damn head off and wasting one hell of a lot of tax payers dollars beside.

Much of Bazelon's writing has been strongly critical of the pro-life movement and opponents of legal abortion, including pro-life feminists and proponents of the concept of post-abortion syndrome, while supportive of abortion providers and pro-choice federal judges. She has accused crisis pregnancy centers of being "all about bait-and-switch" and "falsely maligning" the abortion procedure. Bazelon has been described by some commentators as "strongly pro-choice" and a "prominent pro-choicer." She has acknowledged her support for legal abortion on her Double X blog, commenting, "of course there's still an argument that access to legal abortion is also crucial to opportunity for women. Think how much some women's lives would constrict if they really had to carry every pregnancy to term.

But, because his semen was all over her, you can't conclusively say she's lying about being sexually assaulted by DSK. Even liars can get sexually assaulted

Do you ever touch base with reality?

This whole case has been bizarre. It makes no sense as a consensual sexual encounter, and even less sense as a non consensual sexual encounter--but, either way, DSK made it happen

. So if I had a consensus sexual encounter with a woman paid for or not and the woman later pressed false charges it is my fault for having the sex with her in the first place?

The sexual assault prosecution of Dominique Strauss-Kahn had not even been dropped before the French Socialist party celebrations began. Martine Aubry, who may be the party's candidate against Nicolas Sarkozy in nine months' time, described the New York court's decision as an "immense relief" and declared that "we were all waiting for this, for him to finally be able to get out of this nightmare". François Hollande, Mme Aubry's main rival, agreed that "a man with the abilities of Dominique Strauss-Kahn can be useful". And Harlem Désir, the party's interim general secretary, expressed satisfaction at a "happy outcome".

What kind of world do these leaders of the Socialist party live in? No one who reads the original prosecution complaint against Mr Strauss-Kahn and the New York prosecutors' 25-page request for the case to be dismissed could possibly make such reckless remarks. Yesterday's dismissal did not find that no sexual encounter occurred between the ex-head of the IMF and the hotel maid Nafissatou Diallo. There was reliable forensic evidence of a real and rapid encounter, and Ms Diallo quickly reported the incident. The case ended because it had become a "he-said-she-said" dispute and because Ms Diallo's reliability as a witness had collapsed. As the prosecutors put it: "The nature and number of the complainant's falsehoods leave us unable to credit her version of events beyond a reasonable doubt, whatever the truth may be about the encounter between the complainant and the defendant." The outcome, as so often in rape cases, should cause not "immense relief" but immense unease.

To drop the case against Mr Strauss-Kahn was nevertheless the right legal decision. But it does not justify the wholly inappropriate tone of vindication expressed by so many French Socialists and it does not justify the tendency of so much of the French governing class to debate the DSK affair as a purely political event devoid of moral content. Mr Strauss-Kahn is entitled to the presumption of innocence, but he has not been exonerated, as a commentator on French television falsely claimed last night. He has been freed on a technicality, albeit a vital one.

Mr Strauss-Kahn's modernising roles in the often difficult debates in the post-Mitterrand Socialist party and, more recently, his work as an innovative head of the IMF in crucial times deserve real credit. But his public career is over. It should not be resuscitated. He cannot again command the respect required by a senior minister, let alone a head of state. One Berlusconi is enough. A rehabilitation of Mr Strauss-Kahn would dishonour the French left. The Socialist party has enough problems without humiliating itself in such a disturbing manner.

He cannot again command the respect required by a senior minister, let alone a head of state. One Berlusconi is enough.