Imf, Politicians Behaving Badly | featured news

Former International Monetary Fund leader Dominique Strauss-Kahn and a New York City hotel maid have signed a settlement of her sexual-assault lawsuit.

If the New York sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn ever goes to trial, much will doubtless be made of his accuser’s background. But what about his? Since his New York arrest, a French writer has brought a criminal complaint in Paris about an attempted rape she says she suffered at Strauss-Kahn’s hands in 2003. The New York prosecutors made an apparent allusion to her claim at Strauss-Kahn’s first court appearance in May.

A French novelist will file a complaint on Tuesday accusing Dominique Strauss-Kahn of attempted rape, her lawyer said, raising the prospect of a new sex assault investigation starting just as the U.S. case against the former International Monetary Fund chief falters.
The announcement threw Strauss-Kahn’s legal situation in his home country into question, and injected fresh uncertainty into a national debate about whether he will be able to return to his political career and enter the 2012 presidential race.