Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was in police custody overnight on Tuesday over allegations that he took part in orgies in Paris and Washington with prostitutes paid for by businessmen.
The 62-year-old former Socialist minister, who until last year was the frontrunner to replace French President Nicolas Sarkozy as president, had been summoned as a witness, but prosecutors said he was now a suspect.
He turned up voluntarily at a police station in the northern city of Lille and prosecutors said he would be detained on suspicion of “abetting aggravated pimping by an organized gang” and “misuse of company funds.”
A magistrate will decide whether the evidence supports charges on these or other potential offenses. He could be cleared, be charged and released on bail or remanded in custody pending an eventual trial.
A judge late on Tuesday extended Strauss-Kahn’s detention another 24 hours to today, an informed source said.
He can be held a maximum of 96 hours without charge, but was not expected to stay in custody more than 48 hours.
Under French law, aggravated organized pimping carries a prison term of up to 20 years, and profiting from embezzlement five years and a large fine.
Investigating magistrates want to know whether he was aware that the women who entertained him at parties in restaurants, hotels and swingers’ clubs in Washington, Paris and several other European capitals were paid prostitutes.
They will also seek to determine whether Strauss-Kahn knew that the escorts were paid with funds fraudulently obtained by his hosts from a French public works company, for which one of them worked as a senior executive.
Paying a prostitute is not illegal in France, but profiting from vice or embezzling company funds to pay for sex can lead to charges.
The former IMF managing director admits he has an uninhibited sex life, but denies any role in pimping or corruption and he has indicated he will deny any criminal wrongdoing.
Lawyer Henri Leclerc has said his client may not have known he was with prostitutes as “in these parties, you’re not necessarily dressed. I defy you to tell the difference between a nude prostitute and a nude woman of quality.”
Two businessmen, Fabrice Paszkowski, a medical equipment tycoon, and David Roquet, former director of a local subsidiary of building giant BTP Eiffage, have been charged.
The pair have alleged links to a network of French and Belgian prostitutes centered on the Carlton Hotel in Lille, a well-known meeting place of the local business and political elite in a city run by the Socialist Party.
In all, eight people have been charged in connection with the “Carlton affair” — including three executives from the luxury hotel, a leading lawyer and deputy police chief Jean-Christophe Lagarde.
Incumbent Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa on Sunday claimed a runaway victory in the nation’s presidential election, after voters endorsed the young leader’s “iron fist” approach to rampant cartel violence. With more than 90 percent of the votes counted, the National Election Council said Noboa had an unassailable 12-point lead over his leftist rival Luisa Gonzalez. Official results showed Noboa with 56 percent of the vote, against Gonzalez’s 44 percent — a far bigger winning margin than expected after a virtual tie in the first round. Speaking to jubilant supporters in his hometown of Olon, the 37-year-old president claimed a “historic victory.” “A huge hug
Two Belgian teenagers on Tuesday were charged with wildlife piracy after they were found with thousands of ants packed in test tubes in what Kenyan authorities said was part of a trend in trafficking smaller and lesser-known species. Lornoy David and Seppe Lodewijckx, two 19-year-olds who were arrested on April 5 with 5,000 ants at a guest house, appeared distraught during their appearance before a magistrate in Nairobi and were comforted in the courtroom by relatives. They told the magistrate that they were collecting the ants for fun and did not know that it was illegal. In a separate criminal case, Kenyan Dennis
A judge in Bangladesh issued an arrest warrant for the British member of parliament and former British economic secretary to the treasury Tulip Siddiq, who is a niece of former Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who was ousted in August last year in a mass uprising that ended her 15-year rule. The Bangladeshi Anti-Corruption Commission has been investigating allegations against Siddiq that she and her family members, including Hasina, illegally received land in a state-owned township project near Dhaka, the capital. Senior Special Judge of Dhaka Metropolitan Zakir Hossain passed the order on Sunday, after considering charges in three separate cases filed
APPORTIONING BLAME: The US president said that there were ‘millions of people dead because of three people’ — Vladimir Putin, Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelenskiy US President Donald Trump on Monday resumed his attempts to blame Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for Russia’s invasion, falsely accusing him of responsibility for “millions” of deaths. Trump — who had a blazing public row in the Oval Office with Zelenskiy six weeks ago — said the Ukranian shared the blame with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the February 2022 invasion, and then-US president Joe Biden. Trump told reporters that there were “millions of people dead because of three people.” “Let’s say Putin No. 1, but let’s say Biden, who had no idea what the hell he was doing, No. 2, and
RSS