Next Gen News

The maid's lawyer, Kenneth Thompson, fired the first shots by declaring that his client would shed her right to privacy and soon go to the media to tell her story. He then repeated her version of events in front of hundreds of journalists and live on TV, with references to her "bruised vagina" and a description of how she spat Strauss-Kahn's semen all over the floor and walls of his room after the alleged assault. "The victim will stand before you," he told the news conference.

Surely there would be a huge appetite in the global media for a set-piece interview with the 32-year-old Guinea-born woman. It would be a potentially damaging public relations experience for Strauss-Kahn and his elaborately assembled team of lawyers who have much expertise in Waging celebrity trials. It could also encourage to consider Strauss-Kahn 's team a plea much lesser charges, to the damaging wave of advertising to curb, and pave the way for Strauss-Kahn to return to French politics, and perhaps even campaign for the next year 's presidential elections.

But the PR battle has another side. Strauss-Kahn 's lawyers advised by a leading consultancy in Washington, TD International, which is run by former CIA officers and American diplomats sought. Sources for Strauss-Kahn 's team in the near leaking gossip and information on New York were told journalists. Yesterday, the conservative tabloid, the New York Post blared one story claims that the girl was a prostitute at the Sofitel down by their union. The story was just someone in the relative proximity of Strauss-Kahn 's defense and presented no evidence to back the allegations. The union involved in the story \ called "absurd".

The New York Times

Faced with that sort of PR gaffe, experts believe that even Friday's legal developments have still left him with a serious image problem. "When the debate is between those who accuse you of rape and those who defend you as a mere disgusting cad, your image problems have not emerged from critical care," wrote

But the real target of both sides in the case is not the general public. It is the prosecution lawyers and their boss, the Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance. Thompson said he believed Vance was wavering in his prosecution of the case after Friday's revelations, in which it was revealed that the maid had lied about a previous rape claim, had links to suspected drug dealing and money-laundering and gave an inaccurate account of her behaviour after the alleged assault. "We believe the DA is laying the foundation to dismiss this case and we don't agree with that," Thompson said. "The DA has an obligation to stand up for this rape victim."

With the Strauss-Kahn case, Vance is staring at a toxic mix of class and race in another high-profile sex case. Pitting one of the most powerful white men in the world against a poor, black, female asylum seeker was never going to be straightforward, but with the credibility of the witness undermined, it is becoming a minefield.