Lawyer defends Strauss-Kahn accuser
The hotel maid accusing Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sex assault has been wrongfully portrayed as a money grabbing opportunist in newspaper accounts of her recorded remarks to an incarcerated friend, her lawyer said after they reviewed the tapes during a nearly eight-hour meeting with prosecutors.
The tapes also established that housekeeper Nafissatou Diallo recounted the attack to the man during their first conversation, a day after the alleged attack - showing, her lawyer said, that her focus was on what had happened to her, not on the former International Monetary Fund leader's wealth or stature.
"Information has been put out there about Ms Diallo that now I know was false. She never was scheming to take DSK's money, and that's a fact," said her attorney, Kenneth Thompson, referring to Strauss-Kahn by his initials.
Ms Diallo herself did not speak to reporters, and the Manhattan District Attorney's office declined to comment on the meeting.
The marathon session marked the 32-year-old's first meeting with prosecutors since they said on July 1 they had doubts about her credibility because she had not been truthful about her background or what she did right after the May 14 encounter.
Strauss-Kahn denies the charges, and his lawyers are calling for the case to be dismissed.
Ms Diallo's sit-down with prosecutors came days after she went public in interviews with Newsweek and ABC News, pressing for prosecutors to keep pursuing the case.
Prosecutors and Strauss-Kahn's lawyers said they had agreed to postpone his next court date from August 1 to August 23, when prosecutors could announce whether they will go forward with the case.
Strauss-Kahn, who had been considered a promising French presidential contender, was arrested after Ms Diallo said he forced her to perform oral sex, manhandled her and ripped down her stockings in his luxury suite at the Sofitel Hotel near Manhattan's Times Square.
Traces of Strauss-Kahn's semen were found on her work uniform. He has been charged with attempted rape and other crimes.
Prosecutors have said the case has been weakened by Ms Diallo's fabrications, including a compelling story she told them of having been gang-raped in her native Guinea.
The widowed immigrant, who has a 15-year-old daughter, says she had embellished her life story to gain asylum in the US, and what prosecutors call inconsistencies in her account of her actions right after the alleged attack were the result of a misunderstanding.
Mr Thompson said he, Ms Diallo, prosecutors and an interpreter spent hours on another question that has arisen about her associations and conduct: her recorded conversations with a friend who is being held in an Arizona immigration detention centre after pleading guilty in a marijuana case. The two spoke on the recording in Fulani, a West African language.
The tapes have not been released, and Mr Thompson said he was allowed to hear them but did not get copies of them.
They contrast with a New York Times account of what Ms Diallo had said, according to Mr Thompson.
The newspaper has reported, citing an anonymous law enforcement official, that Ms Diallo said "words to the effect of, 'Don't worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I'm doing'" to her friend shortly after Strauss-Kahn's arrest.
But on the tapes, her mentions of Strauss-Kahn's resources and her knowing what to do are made at different points, and in contexts that cast them in a considerably different light, Mr Thompson said.
In her first conversation with the man, she did not mention Strauss-Kahn's wealth at all, instead telling her friend that "someone tried to rape me, and that he's a powerful, big man", who had tried to take her clothes off, pushed her, and ultimately made her do something against her will, Mr Thompson said.
In a subsequent conversation, she told her friend that her attacker "is powerful and rich", her lawyer said. But it was earlier in that conversation - and not in connection with any mention of Strauss-Kahn's status - that she said "I know what to do" to signal that she had gone to authorities, planned to hire a lawyer and would be all right, Mr Thompson said.
"Her primary focus was on what happened to her, how she was coping with the fact that she had almost been raped," he said.
The Associated Press has previously reported that Ms Diallo alluded to Strauss-Kahn's wealth in a recorded conversation days after the ex-IMF leader's arrest, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss matters not made public in court.
Although Mr Thompson said Ms Diallo was not focused on Strauss-Kahn's money, he said it would be her right to sue him over the encounter.
"There is nothing wrong with a woman who's almost been raped filing a lawsuit to stand up for her dignity as a woman," the lawyer said.
Prosecutors and Ms Diallo have had a tense relationship in recent weeks.
Her last meeting with prosecutors, in late June, ended with her in tears as prosecutors asked about her past and life, Mr Thompson has said. This month, he called on the district attorney's office to recuse itself and arrange for a special prosecutor.
But the rift appeared to close a bit, at least on Ms Diallo's end, with Mr Thompson calling prosecutors "gracious" for accommodating his request to hear the recording. He said he did not anticipate further meetings this week.
Ms Diallo plans to join religious, women's and African community groups today at a Brooklyn Christian centre to thank New Yorkers who support her.
