The Nature of the Tragedy

    The outcome of the Strauss-Kahn criminal case was, in the purest sense, a low-down dirty shame, but one need not invite debate over the meaning or the application of "reasonable doubt" to label it as such.
    Indeed, I can think of no substitute for reasonable doubt as a standard of evidence, and would even admit - though it breaks my heart to do so - that Ms. Diallo's testimony and accompanying credibility would not, at the time of the case's dismissal, have been sufficient to yield a conviction.
    The tragedy, the hideous outcome of it all, is that no one seemed to try. The case never made it to trial, an environment in which Diallo's testimony might have grown into something less doubt-provoking than it had been before; an environment wherein, failing all else, the seriousness of her claims would at least have receivd the legal attention it deserved.
    Had the case gone to trial, prosecutors might have balanced the holes in her credibility against a detail the media circus, and the court of public opinion it informed, never managed to address - the corresponding holes in Mr. Strauss-Kahn's credibility. Why, for instance, did he fail to provide details of where he went immediately after the alleged encounter until three weeks later? Why did French Journalist Tristan Banon come forward the day after Mr. Strauss-Kahn's arrest and claim he had attacked her in 2002?  How were these details not assigned even a tenth the importance of Ms. Diallo's botched asylum application, or her murky financial history?
    Had the case gone to trial, prosecutors might have countered the construction of the malicious, gold-digging maid with claims that stressed its unlikelihood. After three years of employment at the Sofitel Hotel, Strauss-Khan was hardly the first wealthy guest with whom Diallo came in contact. Were the accumulation of wealth her motive, the proximity of rich folk her opportunity, and the fabrication of rape her means, would she not have attempted such a stunt long ago?
    At the end of the day, it may still have devolved into one person's word against another, which would not have been enough to convict Strauss-Kahn, but the poignancy of these matters makes repugnant the move that silenced them forever.
    Rob Clyne of Sabotage Times puts it a bit more bluntly: ". . . this is rape we’re talking about. This is an accusation of a man forcing his penis into a woman’s mouth. Doubt, reasonable or otherwise, is not a strong enough reason to dismiss a case of this nature. The law protected DSK to such an extent that he didn’t even have to face cross examination. Justice, it seems, is in hiding. A depressing outlook for women’s rights and brave victims of sexual assault."
     Indeed.
     And now the would-be case is utterly vulnerable to media postulations, a process that has already canonized Diallo the Liar while leaving Strauss-Kahn ambiguous.
    Ms. Dialo may or may not be a victim (I of course think she was) but her treatment in the media aligns closely enough with the victim-blaming paradigm that I, for one, feel justified in puking.