Ex-head of IMF faces civil trial over ‘rape bid’ claim

The maid, 33, says Strauss-Kahn, 63, tried to rape her in his Manhattan hotel suite in May last year. Strauss-Kahn has denied doing anything violent during the encounter.

Prosecutors dropped related criminal charges last year.

Strauss-Kahn’s lawyers said the civil lawsuit should also be dismissed. They argued he has diplomatic immunity because of his former post as head of the International Monetary Fund. He resigned shortly after his arrest.

The maid’s lawyers say the immunity argument relies on a United Nations agreement that the US did not sign.

Bronx state Supreme Court Justice Douglas McKeon ruled the civil case can go ahead.

Prosecutors dropped criminal charges last summer, saying they had doubts about Nafissatou Diallo’s trustworthiness because she had lied about her background and her actions after the alleged attack.

She has insisted she told the truth about what happened in the encounter itself.

Strauss-Kahn did not assert immunity from the criminal prosecution, and he resigned from his IMF job days after his arrest. But his lawyers argued he should be immune from the civil lawsuit, which was filed about three months later.

That “may seem like an unfair result to some, but it’s the result the law compels,” Strauss-Kahn attorney lawyer Amit P Mehta said at a hearing in March.

They pointed to a 1947 UN agreement that afforded the privilege to heads of “specialised agencies,” including the IMF. Although the US did not sign that agreement, Strauss-Kahn’s attorneys said it has gained such broad acceptance elsewhere that it has become what is known as “customary international law”.

Although Strauss-Kahn no longer had the IMF job when he was sued, his lawyers argued he still had immunity because another international agreement gives departing diplomats a “reasonable” amount of time to leave host countries before their immunity expires.

At the time, Strauss-Kahn was under a criminal court order to stay in the United States, his attorneys said.

But Diallo’s lawyers said the immunity claim is off base. They stressed that an IMF spokesman said shortly after Strauss-Kahn’s arrest that he did not have immunity because he was on personal business during his encounter with Diallo. Strauss-Kahn was visiting his daughter in New York.

“Dominique Strauss-Kahn thinks he’s above the law,” one of Diallo’s lawyers, Kenneth P Thompson, said after the March hearing.

Judge McKeon’s decision to allow the case to proceed was first reported by The New York Post.