Muted response to prospect of Strauss-Kahn return

PARIS (Reuters) - Cleared of sex assault charges, Dominique Strauss-Kahn could be back in France within days but may not get a hero's welcome, if sober newspaper editorials and cautious statements by his Socialist allies are anything to go by.

Newspapers focused on Wednesday on the stain to his image from his liaison with a New York hotel maid and his political allies reluctant to speculate on his plans.

Strauss-Kahn could be home as early as next week, after settling his affairs in Washington where he was based as head of the International Monetary Fund until his mid-May arrest on attempted rape charges, which were dropped on Tuesday.

His lawyer in France, Henri Leclerc, said he was not aware of a set date for Strauss-Kahn to return.

Far from celebrating the exoneration of a man who had been pegged as France's next president before his arrest and who has long been affectionately known in France by his initials DSK, newspaper editorials were sober and reflective.

"Far from being cleared, DSK will now have to live with, rather like another kind of sentence, the suspicious regard of public opinion," wrote Yves Threard in the daily Le Figaro.

Left-wing Liberation ran its story under the headline: "One dismissal but three ball-and-chains" referring to the three open legal cases against Strauss-Kahn relating to alleged misconduct.

The main opposition Socialist Party, which lost its top economic thinker with Strauss-Kahn's downfall, has cheered the dropping of charges but given no indication of what role he might play in the future, focusing instead on preparing for its annual congress this weekend in the seaside town of La Rochelle.

Segolene Royal, one of a handful of Socialist presidential hopefuls, sought to change the subject when pressed on BFM TV to talk about Strauss-Kahn. "I don't want to comment about this. I will not discuss his future activities," she said.

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who polls show could win around 13 percent of the vote in the first election round in April, said the dropping of all the criminal sex assault charges left a "nauseating" and "bitter" taste in the mouth.

TUMBLING DOWN

The decision to scrap the case against the former finance minister ended a three-month saga that filled newspapers around the world with sordid details about his 9-minute liaison with maid Nafissatou Diallo, which his lawyers say was consensual.

Political analysts say Strauss-Kahn may never completely win back the respect of the French people and could struggle to be accepted in public office given the tarnishing of his image from the case and what it revealed about his private life.

"It's all come tumbling down," a woman who gave her name as Besma told Reuters Television in Paris. "It's too ambiguous. Already in Paris there are a lot of stories about him. He has a certain notoriety. I think the least he could do, even if it's his private life, is to have a certain image."

Diallo is pursuing a civil case against Strauss-Kahn, and an inquiry is under way in France over allegations he tried to sexually assault writer Tristane Banon in 2003. Diallo's lawyers have also filed a complaint against a Strauss-Kahn ally in France for allegedly trying to silence a witness with money.

Strauss-Kahn's public relations office declined any comment on Wednesday, but his U.S. lawyer Benjamin Brafman told the daily Le Parisien the former IMF chief had things to settle there in the United States before returning to France.

He said he was confident Diallo's civil case would also collapse and he that there would be no financial settlement.

"One thing must be clear to the French: DSK has no intention and has never had any intention of giving her money," he said.

(Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Strauss-Kahn prosecutors hemmed in by own choices

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Those looking to draw lessons from the roller-coaster prosecution of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, which formally ended on Tuesday, may not get much satisfaction from Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance.

Even after the dismissal of all charges against the former International Monetary Fund chief, who was arrested May 14 and charged with sexually assaulting a hotel maid, Vance's office will admit to no errors of judgment or strategy in its handling of the case.

"This case was handled appropriately at every step," said spokeswoman Erin Duggan.

But the world was transfixed for more than three months by every twist and turn in the case, and Vance's post has long been one of the most closely scrutinized in the country, primarily because of the many high-profile cases it brings.

And so nagging questions remain. What could Vance have done differently? And how, if at all, will this change the District Attorney's approach to future cases?

BAIL OR JAIL

Six days or six months? This decision at the outset of the case may have been the most fateful choice made by prosecutors.

On May 16, two days after Nafissatou Diallo accused the managing director of the International Monetary Fund of sexual assault, Strauss-Kahn sat handcuffed in New York City Criminal Court, and Vance's office had a decision to make.

If prosecutors convinced a judge to hold him without bail, they would be required by law to win a grand jury indictment -- formal charges by a secret panel -- within six days or perhaps let Strauss-Kahn go.

If they agreed to bail, they would have up to six months to make their case. But in that scenario, they risked criticism that Strauss-Kahn was buying his way out of a jail cell, and faced the problem that he might attempt to flee the country. His native France, where he had been seen as a leading presidential contender, lacks an extradition treaty with the United States.

Prosecutors chose to keep him in custody, and with the judge's agreement Strauss-Kahn was sent to the notorious Rikers Island jail until released on house arrest after three days.

With less than a week for the grand jury's decision, prosecutors were forced to rely on Diallo's word before they knew much about her. Experts said this put them in a very difficult position.

"Once you make that decision and you persuade a judge, things move very fast," said Paul Shechtman, a former New York prosecutor. "If you'd made a different bail decision, then you could have investigated."

"I question whether the case should have been indicted in the first place," said Jeremy Saland, a former Manhattan prosecutor.

But former Manhattan sex-crimes prosecutor Matthew Galluzzo said he saw little difference between an investigation taking place under the shadow of an indictment and one occurring while Strauss-Kahn remained in the United States on bail.

"Being indicted is not that much worse of a situation than being arrested," he said. "It seemed like a strong case. He (Vance) got duped (by Diallo)."

THE LETTER

The next turning point came on June 30, when prosecutors filed a letter acknowledging for the first time that they were losing faith in Diallo's credibility.

Legal analysts praised the move, which was prompted by legal requirements that all potentially exculpatory evidence be disclosed to the defense. But Vance's office still chose to continue the investigation, requesting more than a month of postponements to the next hearing -- a move that appeared to some as an attempt to provide political cover for an ultimate dismissal of the charges against Strauss-Kahn.

The letter also prompted Diallo and her attorney, Kenneth Thompson, to go on the offensive. Their media blitz altered the tenor of the case, as the tension between Diallo and the prosecutors began to draw as much attention as the question of what actually occurred in Strauss-Kahn's hotel suite on May 14.

THE DISMISSAL

Vance's last decision -- to drop the case -- may well have been predetermined, given what prosecutors said was Diallo's inability to tell the truth. Legal analysts said other prosecutors might have continued to prosecute, on the principle that you need only probable cause and a complaining witness to bring a case to a jury.

An example of the danger in this approach, Paul Shechtman said, was the Duke University lacrosse case, in which a district attorney violated a raft of rules in pressing rape charges against several college students that were eventually revealed as fabricated.

LESSONS

In the end, the Strauss-Kahn case was so unusual that it would be difficult to speculate how it might affect future decisions by the District Attorney's office.

Benjamin Brafman, who represented Strauss-Kahn and vigorously maintained his innocence, was nonetheless sympathetic toward Vance.

"In fairness to him, there were some facts that suggested to him and the police this was a case that should be pursued and they took a very aggressive position," Brafman told Reuters in an interview.

"It was the right call (to drop charges)," Brafman said. "But it still takes a great deal of integrity to stand up in court and say that the witness you relied on is no longer reliable based on your own investigation."

But Vance did not receive the same sympathy from Diallo's lawyer, Kenneth Thompson, who accused him of capitulating to a wealthy, powerful defendant.

Standing outside the courthouse Tuesday after the charges had been dismissed, Thompson said, "If Dominique Strauss-Kahn was a bus driver from the South Bronx, do you really think that the district attorney would be running away?"

(Additional reporting by Noeleen Walder; Editing by Jesse Wegman, Daniel Trotta and Jackie Frank)

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