Alleged sexual assault case against DSK to be dropped

Former International Monetary Fund chief, Domique Strauss-Kahn is set to walk free after New York prosecutors said they could not prove the alleged sexual assault case brought against him by a hotel maid.

Nafissatou Diallo with her lawyer Kenneth Thompson Reuters/Brendan McDermid

Within hours, New York state judge Michael Obus is due to rule on the motion filed by the prosecutors to dismiss all charges against Strauss-Kahn leaving him free to return to France with his millionaire wife.

The 25-page motion to drop the case concluded that DSK, as he is commonly known in France, did engage in a hurried sex act on 14 May with the Manhattan maid, Nafissatou Diallo and that the initial investigation did suggest an assault.

But the evidence including DNA evidence on the maid's clothing was not conclusive. For example, there were no injuries or damage to clothing that could have come from an attempted rape.

The lack of conclusive evidence meant the case would rest on Diallo's testimony which was called into question when she was found to have lied to investigators over her asylum application to the United States.

She claimed during her interview with immigration authorities that she had been gang-raped in her native Guinea. She later said she had made up the entire story.

There were also contradicitions over what she did following the alleged attack. In one version she hid in a corridor, in another she returned to DSK's room to clean after he had left.

Diallo's lawyer Kenneth Thompson said the Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance had denied the right to a woman to get justice in a rape case. He accused Vance of turing his back on forensic, medical and other physical evidence.

He now plans to ask the judge overseeing the case to appoint a special proscutor to investigate the alleged assault claims saying Vance had mishandled the case.

Despite the apparent collapse of the case in New York, DSK could still face other sexual assault charges when he returns to France.

In one case, a 32-year-old writer, Tristane Banon has filed a complaint alleging the 62-year-old socialist politicial tried to rape her after luring her to a Paris flat in 2003.

Strauss-Kahn has denied the claim and says he will sue Banon for defamation.