Former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who was cleared last month of charges that he assaulted a hotel maid in New York, asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuit brought by his accuser.
Strauss-Kahn, 62, said in a motion filed with Judge Douglas McKeon in New York State Supreme Court in the Bronx borough of New York City yesterday that the lawsuit filed by the maid, Nafissatou Diallo, should be thrown out because Strauss-Kahn had diplomatic immunity.
“As managing director — which is the chief executive position at the IMF — Mr. Strauss-Kahn enjoyed absolute immunity from civil suit under applicable principles of international law,” according to the filing by William W. Taylor III, an attorney for Strauss-Kahn.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.’s office last month dropped sexual-assault charges filed against Strauss-Kahn in May after Diallo accused him of trying to rape her in his suite at the Sofitel in midtown Manhattan. Diallo, 33, sued Strauss-Kahn on Aug. 8, seeking unspecified damages.
Diallo’s attorneys, Kenneth P. Thompson and Douglas H. Wigdor, said in a statement that Strauss-Kahn’s claim of diplomatic immunity will fail because he isn’t a diplomat, was in New York on personal business and paid for his own room.
“This baseless motion is another desperate attempt to avoid having to answer for the deplorable acts he committed against Ms. Diallo,” Thompson and Wigdor said in the statement.
The case is Diallo v. Strauss-Kahn, 11-307065, New York State Supreme Court (Bronx County).
To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Dolmetsch in New York at cdolmetsch@bloomberg.net
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