Joel Cohen: DSK and the Rest of Those on the Criminal Docket

Joel Cohen: DSK and the Rest of Those on the Criminal Docket

"The case appears to be over. Dominique Strauss-Kahn will return to France a free man and be acclaimed for his triumph over the egregious elements of so-called U.S. legal justice. In fact, he may even be guilty of a violent attack on a hotel chambermaid. But that doesn't really doesn't matter anymore. The "alleged" victim (one must continue to use "alleged") is a liar -- and provably so -- and whether she lied also about the ultimate issue in the case (i.e. whether she was forced to give him sex) is now beside the point now. She has done irreparable damage to her own credibility and, perhaps more importantly, to rape victims everywhere. They will now know the cost of coming forward with rape complaints when it is they, perhaps even more than the accused, who will become the target. Indeed, legal protections of rape victims by rape shield laws and removing corroboration requirements may be in jeopardy.

Nor does it matter whether it was the prosecutors, the world-wide press, or the defense attorneys who discovered the maid's litany of lies. It appears, at least at the moment, that the prosecutors themselves either became suspicious or were told of some problems in her story by her own attorney. It was inevitable that DSK's able attorneys would have for use at trial at least some of the extremely-exculpatory material -- the false claims on her asylum petition; the phony tax deduction; the false account of her hiding just before she complained; the relationship with a drug dealer and multiple telephone numbers; the suspicious deposits to her bank account; and the recorded bragging that she knew how to deal with the "rich guy."

Why? First, the press was all over this case. The French press even had the victim's name in print (something that wouldn't occur but for Strauss-Kahn's status in France) which the prosecutors knew would yield "unhelpful" personal information about her coming out of the woodwork on both sides of the Atlantic. And second, in this "rich man's case," the defense simply had unlimited resources to investigate her, with or without the press's assistance. And the prosecutors surely knew how deadly that combination can be for a successful prosecution.

It is unimportant now whether DSK did indeed have a sexual encounter with the victim. His lawyers pretty much admitted that from Day 1. And likewise we shouldn't be concerned that it is much-more-than-likely that cash was somehow involved. However, charming or powerful DSK might be, one suspects that his charm or power would not have been the driving force in the victim's "willingness" to have sex with him, if indeed it was a willingness. So, if the French are willing to forgive DSK for his own personalized version of pay-for-play, why should it be any of our business? "