Strauss-Kahn Accuser Files Libel Suit Against New York Post

The hotel chambermaid at the center of the sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn has filed a libel suit against the New York Post newspaper and five of its reporters for describing her as a prostitute in a story.

The woman, a 32-year-old immigrant from Guinea in West Africa, alleged the Post of defaming her in articles written between July 2 and July 4, citing their publication as an apparent desperate attempt to bolster its rapidly plunging sales.

She accused the paper of printing details that they knew were false.

In its edition from Saturday, the Post wrote that the chambermaid was doing double duty as a prostitute, collecting cash on the side from male guests. An article from Sunday claimed that she continued to work as a prostitute in a Brooklyn hotel where she was stashed by prosecutors.

The suit states: All of these statements are false, have subjected the plaintiff to humiliation, scorn and ridicule throughout the world by falsely portraying her as a prostitute or as a woman who trades her body for money and they constitute defamation and libel per se.”

Filed in The Bronx state court, the suit seeks damages that would be determined at a trial.

However, questions over the credibility and questionable background of the woman had forced New York prosecutors to drop their rape charges against Strauss-Kahn.