As we all expected, after the Manhattan DA's Office dropped its sexual assault case against him, former IMF head and leading French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn has left his gilded Tribeca cage for his homeland. Strauss-Kahn left New York last night, happily bidding farewell to the mob of reporters outside his $50,000/month townhouse, taking an Air France flight at JFK Airport, and then arriving in Paris today. The AP says he was "smiling and waving silently"—and he was also pushing his own luggage—while supporters were cheering. France loves its short, old fat men.
A fellow Socialist party member was relieved by DSK's release, "I’m moved, I always believed in his innocence. I wanted very much for this to be over," and former French Cultural Minister Jack Lang, who defended DSK (of the alleged crime, he said, "Nobody died") and lives down the street from him, said, "I am a happy neighbor. Finally, they are freed from this humiliating and unjust situation. They proved to have an amazing strength." They being DSK and his wife, billionaire heiress Anne Sinclair.
Back in May, a hotel maid at the Times Square Sofitel accused Strauss-Kahn of trying to rape her and forcing her to perform oral sex on him in his suite. Strauss-Kahn was removed from an Air France flight back to Paris, arrested, perp-walked to the Special Victims Unit, and incited an international incident. His lawyers claimed his innocence, insisting that the accuser had ulterior motives, and then it appeared the case against Strauss-Kahn was weak because the accuser had some inconsistencies in her story. Eventually, the accuser made herself public and insisted the attack was not a ploy for money. The accuser's lawyer is pursuing a civil suit on her behalf.
