IMF chief to face New York court in sex assault case
May 16th, 2011 - 7:13 pm ICT by IANSNew York, May 16 (IANS) International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn will make his first appearance in a court here Monday to answer charges of sexual assault on a maid in his New York hotel suite.
A handcuffed Strauss-Kahn was taken by New York Police detectives from a police station to the Manhattan Criminal Court building to await his arraignment in the case that has sent shock waves through French politics and threw the international finance institution in a turmoil.
The arraignment of Strauss-Kahn, 62, who was widely expected to become a French presidential candidate before the shocking case, was delayed a day after he agreed to forensic tests requested by police, his attorney William Taylor said.
Strauss-Kahn’s accuser picked the IMF chief out of a line-up Sunday at a New York police station, singling him out as the man who had sexually assaulted her, according to a law enforcement official cited by CNN.
Strauss-Kahn, who has been charged with attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment, willingly consented to a physical and forensic examination that had been requested by police, Taylor said. Those tests were conducted Sunday night.
Police allege that Strauss-Kahn sexually assaulted the 32-year-old woman Saturday at the Sofitel hotel in Manhattan, and then quickly headed off to New York’s J.F.K. airport to board a Paris-bound flight.
A former French finance minister, national legislator and economics professor in Paris, Strauss-Kahn became the IMF’s 10th managing director in November 2007. He is also chairman of the IMF executive board.
New York Police Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said Strauss-Kahn does not have diplomatic immunity in this case nor, to the commissioner’s knowledge, has he claimed it.
The IMF Sunday postponed an informal session where members were to be “briefed on developments” related to Strauss-Kahn, the organisation said.
The executive board meeting was “postponed pending further developments in New York”, IMF spokesman William Murray said in an e-mail to CNN.
While Strauss-Kahn had not officially entered the race, recent French opinion polls showed him as the leading prospective Socialist Party presidential candidate.
The surveys also suggested he posed a stiff challenge to incumbent French President Nicolas Sarkozy in the 2012 election.
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