Dominique Strauss-Kahn: IMF = I’m fried

The cell is 11 x 13 foot (3.3 x 3.9 meters). The luxury suite at the Sofitel hotel was apparently $3,000 a night. He wears a grey jumpsuit with slip-on shoes. He used to wear executive suits and fine leather shoes. While under the watchful eyes of the guards, he is alone. He used to hobnob with the world’s elite.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, head of the International Monetary Fund, was a potential candidate for the presidency of France. He now is locked up awaiting trial on sexual assault charges. His lawyer has said that he will plead not guilty, but the IMF is looking to replace him and the possibility of him coming back to run in next year’s elections are just about nil. Whether he is found culpable or not, it would not be incorrect to say that he is finished. While Strauss-Kahn has not yet had his day in court, the court of public opinion is building a case against him as others are coming forward with tales of having run into this gentleman – I use the term loosely – in not the best of circumstances.

The Daily Mail is reporting that Tristane Banon, the 31-year-old god-daughter of Strauss-Kahn’s second wife Brigitte Guillemette, claims he attacked her almost a decade ago. The alleged attempted rape, which took place in an anonymous studio flat in Paris in 2002, had Strauss-Kahn luring the then 21-year-old trainee journalist to the property under the promise of an interview, and then started to rip her clothes off. ‘I kicked him, I called him a rapist, he didn’t seem to care,’ said Ms Banon in earlier interviews, in which she also described Strauss-Kahn as acting like a ‘rutting chimpanzee’. Ms Banon’s mother, Anne Mansouret, said the only reason she did not press charges at the time was because ‘she was just starting out in journalism’ and was afraid of being ‘defined by the story’ of being attacked by a senior politician. Mrs Mansouret has now confirmed that her daughter is making a report to Paris police, and may hold a press conference about an ordeal which left her ‘traumatised’. Lawyer David Koubbi said that his client, Ms Banon, is ‘considering filing a complaint’.

In another Daily Mail article, we learn of other dalliances. French socialist politician Auriele Filippetti said the IMF chief had groped her in 2008 and from then on vowed to make sure she was never alone in a room with him. Piroska Nagy, a Hungarian economist who had a brief affair with Strauss Kahn when both were married in 2008, told investigators that he had a problem and that she felt coerced into sleeping with him because of his senior position and aggressive advances.

For a long time, France and other European countries have had the attitude that one’s personal life is personal and does not affect how one did their job. But is that true? The Christian Science Monitor writes

A leading French political commentator told The New York Times that journalists haven’t done their job properly. For instance, he now regrets saying nothing about a former French foreign minister who was involved with the daughter of Syria’s defense minister. “I was wrong. It had an impact on France’s foreign policy,” said Pierre Haski.

Former French President Francois Mitterand once answered “yes, it’s true, and so what?” to a journalist’s question about whether he had an out-of-wedlock daughter. Only after his death did it come out that the French government had financially supported his mistress and daughter.

The CSM goes on to make a telling comment about the investigation in 2008 of his affair with an IMF subordinate, a Hungarian economist named Piroska Nagy. The affair was found to be consensual, but to have shown poor judgment.

The separation of the private-and-work spheres is not as tidy as the French may imagine. A boss who exercises power over employees to win sexual favors can poison an office. In a letter to IMF investigators, Ms. Nagy wrote that she was “damned if I did and damned if I didn’t” agree to the affair, which was brief. She also noted that Strauss-Kahn has “a problem that may make him ill-equipped to lead an institution where women work under his command.”

Strauss-Kahn is currently being held without bail pending a grand jury investigation into the charges — which include attempted rape, sex abuse, a criminal sex act, unlawful imprisonment and forcible touching. The top count is punishable by five to 25 years in prison.

Click here to read the criminal complaint against Strauss-Kahn (CBS)

Associated Press – May 18/2011

Strauss-Kahn Seems on Way Out, One Way or Another

Confined to a jail cell, his reputation in tatters and facing serious criminal charges, Dominique Strauss-Kahn is almost certainly on his way out as head of the International Monetary Fund. The main question is whether he’ll go willingly.

Consent

The Guardian reports that Strauss-Kahn’s likely defence will be that the maid consented, but goes on to say this will be a long and ugly court battle. Prosecutors will obviously go after his credibility and with other women coming forward with their stories of past encounters, that credibility is going to be stretched to the limit.

ABC News – May 18/2011

‘Real Deal’: Who Is Dominique Strauss-Kahn, DSK, in 90 Seconds

A revealing look at the life of Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Click HERE to read more from William Belle

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