Strauss-Kahn's French Accuser Plans Civil Suit

In a televised interview Monday night, Tristane Banon -- the French writer who has accused Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sexual assault -- said she will sue the former-banker if French authorities decide not to open a criminal trial.

In May, Banon claimed that Strauss-Kahn tried to kiss her during a 2003 interview, and then forced himself on top of her.

He double-locked the door and left the keys in the lock, I didn't feel good but I couldn't have imagined what was going to happen, and very quickly, we fought, the 32-year-old Banon told French TV channel Canal+.

It deteriorated and I think that if I didn't have a lot of luck it would have ended up as a rape.

Strauss-Kahn, who himself gave a televised interview on Sunday, did admit that he momentarily put a move on the journalist -- who was also the daughter of a family friend -- but stopped once it was clear that Banon wasn't interested.

Banon filed a formal complaint with French authorities shortly after Strauss-Kahn was arrested in New York City for allegedly raping a hotel maid. Prosecutors in Paris are reluctant to open the Banon case because, they say, it would be difficult to prove wrong-doing in an eight-year old incident.

Strauss-Kahn had to resign from his post as the head of the International Monetary Fund in wake of the scandal. He was also kept under house arrest in New York while a criminal trial was underway, but prosecutors threw out the case last month because they couldn't prove that the sexual act wasn't consensual.

Strauss-Kahn was also considered to be a front-runner in the upcoming French presidential elections, but his political hopes have dwindled.

During his television appearance, Strauss-Kahn admitted to committing a moral fault of which I am not proud in the New York hotel room. He did not say that he was guilty of any criminal act, nor he did apologize to the maid, France, or Banon.

He did mention the infidelity against his wife Anne Sinclair, calling it “a failing vis-á-vis my wife.

“What happened was without violence or constraint or aggression or any criminal act. The prosecutor says that, not I, Strauss-Kahn noted, waving a copy of the prosecutors' report as both proof and as a prop.

He also called Banon's allegations imaginary and slanderous.