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The Strauss-Kahn Entrapment
When the news about "rape" allegedly committed by then IMF chief Strauss-Kahn came up I wrote that the case "smells of entrapment":
Now it may of course well be that Mr. Strauss-Kahn didn't behave like a gentleman. But does anybody believe that some other high up, for example the CEO of Goldman Sachs, would have been shamed like this over such an issue without the usual official cover up attempt?
It seems clear now that this case indeed stinks to high heaven:
The sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn is on the verge of collapse as investigators have uncovered major holes in the credibility of the housekeeper who charged that he attacked her in his Manhattan hotel suite in May, according to two well-placed law enforcement officials.
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According to the two officials, the woman had a phone conversation with an incarcerated man within a day of her encounter with Mr. Strauss-Kahn in which she discussed the possible benefits of pursuing the charges against him. The conversation was recorded.
That man, the investigators learned, had been arrested on charges of possessing 400 pounds of marijuana. He is among a number of individuals who made multiple cash deposits, totaling around $100,000, into the woman’s bank account over the last two years. The deposits were made in Arizona, Georgia, New York and Pennsylvania.
The investigators also learned that she was paying hundreds of dollars every month in phone charges to five companies. The woman had insisted she had only one phone and said she knew nothing about the deposits except that they were made by a man she described as her fiancé and his friends.
In addition, one of the officials said, she told investigators that her application for asylum included mention of a previous rape, but there was no such account in the application. She also told them that she had been subjected to genital mutilation, but her account to the investigators differed from what was contained in the asylum application.
With a witness like that any prosecution is dead.
The case was obviously used to move Strauss Khan out as IMF chief. He had argued to forgive debt and to let the bankers bleed. Only two days ago Sarkozy's finance minister, Christine Lagarde, was installed as new neoliberal IMF chief. And today we learn that the case against Strauss-Kahn falters. I do not for a moment believe that this timing is pure coincident. The prosecutors certainly knew about the witness' unreliability for weeks. They fried Strauss-Kahn just long enough to finish the plan.
Whether it was the U.S. who did him in -Strauss-Kahn had also suggested to replace the dollar as reserve currency with IMF Special Drawing Rights-, or the Sarkozy government which wanted to eliminate a Strauss-Kahn as a Sarkozy challenger in the next presidential election in France, will only come out years from now.
What points to Sarkozy is the little publicized fact that the New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, who's department leaked like a sieve all the damaging "facts" about the Strauss-Kahn case, is a friend of Sarkozy who in 2006 was awarded the France’s Legion of Honor by France’s Interior Minister, then one Nicolas Sarkozy.
Whatever it may be. This case, just like the one against Elliot Spitzer and the rape allegations against Julian Assange, will remind anyone in charge anywhere to stay with the bankers' party line. A serious ratfucking, like Strauss-Kahn experienced, will be the penalty for any deviation.
It’s the part about DSK being a do-gooding renegade that still doesn’t make any sense to me. His call for bank haircuts has been a routine part of the standard neo-liberal IMF canon since the beginning of time (almost). – Guthman Bey
I agree.
DSK is neo-liberal (economy)…with a vengeance. I listened to some speeches of his yesterday, they are truly terrifying. A one-world order! Run by Finance! (I interpret and exaggerate a bit..)
Amazing. Attention is now on his anatomy, not his ideas.
The Greeks call him the butcher of the IMF. He castigated and insulted the Greeks for not paying taxes. He himself pays no taxes! (Except for property taxes on property owned by him and his wife in France.) Plus, he is a very strong atlanticist.
Paul Jorion (economist, anthropologist, philosopher, France) explained in his last weekly vid (he runs a blog and his readers pay him 2K euro a month, the vid is to tell us what he is thinking about, also anecdotes, gripping tibits, etc.) that “we” are moving forward, he is not ridiculed as he once was, and some of his ideas are being taken up — by the National Front! (I can’t explain Jorion’s philosophy here, but lodge him way left).
The National Front is the only party contemplating or advocating the kinds of financial reforms “the people” want. For ex. banning CDS (see b as well), forbidding speculation on large classes of financial products, and officially, exiting the Euro.
DSK represents the opposite pole! He put the IMF – which is dominated by the US (right of veto) – back on track doing its splendid good works!
The socialists wanted him as a candidate because the neo-liberal economic corporate RIGHT (as opposed to Le Pen’s traditionalist, nationalist right) would vote for him, and then they, the socialists, would get to place all their puny top ladies and gents in nice juicy spots so they all get RICH. DSK was designated ‘next president of France’ by the world financial cabal, and the anglo press, not the polls in France (with the exception of one that didn’t mean much.)
DSK has only one important enemy: Sark the First. (As far as I can see..)
If there was any influence used, deals made, etc. it was to get DSK freed, rehabilitated, etc. I don’t know the laws of NY state, but in many places the maid’s previous convictions (if any), the maid’s lies to obtain asylum, her bank account,… could not have been presented. Only the facts of the encounter.
Could the defense have seen to that? “Normally” (?), for the trial itself, yes, with a Motion in Limine – but all the dirt on the maid was immediately made public – by whom btw? Cyrus Vance? How can facts unearthed in the discovery phase be made public? Where was her lawyer? Eating truffles? Or is this usual procedure for NY? You can bet that if the ‘rapist’ was Joe Blow the alleged victim would have kept her saintly status.
In short, I don’t, at present, smell or see any evidence for entrapment – except by the maid herself.
I accepted the reports that DNA, sperm, was found both on her and in the room(s) – forgotten where I read that – because I was convinced that the prosecution would not have moved forward without some very strong forensics. Of course, the maid might have engineered that herself – it is possible that she and DSK never even met, which would go a long way to explaining the absolute hubris of the defense lawyers (which I wrote about before), the confidently presented errors in the time-line (DSK was having lunch, etc.) as well as DSK’s very firm Not Guilty posture.
The past and profile of the maid point to someone who would be more likely than others to try and entrap a rich man, no? And her past would be discovered, yes? The accusation would not stick..Well, it might for long enough to appoint Lagarde, would be the argument. But the maid would prove unreliable, marginal criminal, and might spill the beans…in deep trouble she would blab…Not smart, as other more sophisticated bring-downs are easy to come by.
We may find out more in the future. The dirt on the maid does not mean that a sexual assault did not take place (see Xihuitl above), only that she is the kind of person a Jury would disapprove of.
But what a circus, world politics hinging on individual ‘bruised’ vaginas. My post – rambling and roundabout stuff, from French politics to sperm! Argh.
Posted by: Noirette | Jul 3 2011 13:40 utc | 36
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