Strauss-Kahn Video Shows ‘Hotel Maid Truthful’- but is Kahn Trapped?

Six months after a hotel maid accused former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn of rape attempt, surveillance camera footages have emerged which the maid's lawyers call further proof against him.

France's BFMTV has telecast the video clips in which Kahn is seen paying his bill, leaving and getting into a taxi after he was alleged to have sexually assaulted chambermaid Nafissatou Diallo at the New York Sofitel.

Strauss-Kahn is seen in no hurry as he leaves the hotel on May 14, the day he was arrested. Also, Diallo is seen explaining the incident to the other hotel staff members.

Shortly after Strauss-Kahn jumped into a yellow cab and left the scene, Ms Diallo is shown on video demonstrating to her supervisor and hotel security how he pushed her down the hallway to the back of the hotel suite, said Diallo's lawyers Kenneth Thompson and Douglas Wigdor in a statement.

This video shows actions of a victim, not someone who's part of some plot to bring down a man that she had never seen before in her life, attorney Kenneth Thompson told reporters at a news conference, where the footages were played.

No baseless conspiracy theory changes that very important fact, they said and added that they looked forward to a trial for civil damages.

Another video segment that was telecast, recorded 40 minutes after the alleged attack according to BFM, shows Diallo slumped against a wall in a corridor reserved for hotel staff. Though the footage clearly shows body moments, making out facial expression is impossible because of the heavily pixilated picture quality. There are no surveillance cameras on the floor where the alleged attack took place.

The video also shows two other hotel employees celebrating and doing a victory dance in another room, which had fueled speculation that Strauss-Kahn was trapped. However, the staff members in the video told an Accor attorney they had no knowledge of the political status of Dominique Strauss-Kahn before this tape excerpt, said the statement.

They also reaffirmed that they could not remember exactly the reasons for this 'congratulatory action,' or dance, which was for an unrelated reason.

It was on the basis of these video clips that there were reports which suggested that Strauss Kahn might have been the victim of a political plot, but this is the first time it has been publicly aired.

Strauss-Kahn's biographer Michel Taubmann has accused a small group of people from the Sofitel of having Kahn trapped.

I have seen all of the videos... At no point in time, I can assure you, during the three hours that followed the alleged assault does Ms Diallo seem to complain or to cry, Taubmann told AFP.

The fact that she does not cry does not mean she was not raped but it contradicts the account of her lawyers, who say she was overwhelmed, that she suffered horribly from pain in her shoulder. She is seen leaning against a wall, waving her arms about. She never had a shoulder injury, he added.

New York prosecutors had dropped the criminal case against Strauss-Kahn, who had been tipped to win next year's French presidential election, after there were reports that Diallo was unreliable and that she did it for money.

Hotel group Accor, which owns the Sofitel, criticized the telecast of the footages, saying it exposes staff members to media curiosity to no useful purpose.

Kahn is charged with attempted rape after Diallo accused him of attacking her and forcing her to perform oral sex.

The rape charges badly damaged Strauss-Kahn's reputation. A French writer too came forward and accused him of sexually assaulting her during a 2003 interview and claimed that he was connected to a suspected hotel prostitution ring. All the scandals have effectively put an end to his political career.