The Prosecution of Dominique Strauss-Kahn and Therapy

A grand jury indicted Dominique Strauss-Kahn last May over allegations that he had sexually assaulted a Sofital Hotel housekeeper.  Few people doubt that Nafissatou Diallo performed some kind of sexual act in the guest's hotel room that evening in New York.

A judge has finally dismissed the charges. Rape charges, you should know, rarely hold up in court.

Cyrus Vance Jr., the Manhattan district attorney, made the move to dismiss the case because he believed his client, Ms. Diallo could not be trusted as a witness.  She had lied about so many things that it was difficult to believe anything she said, hard to tell fact from fiction. She reported, for example, being gang-raped by soldiers in her native country, then, recanted. Never mind.  We would call one of those a whoppers.

Mr. Vance is saying that his client is devastated, has been crying all night, and that it is only because Mr. Strauss-Kahn is rich and powerful that the charges had to be dropped. If Strauss-Kahn drove a bus, Diallo would have a fair trial. 

We disagree, not with that history of deception, but nobody asked us.  And in this country, the rich and powerful do go to jail.  Sometimes. Illinois has incarcerated three ex-governors: Otto Kerner, Dan Walker, and George Ryan.  Governors swing some power, but not enough when they break the law to escape successful proscecution.

Strauss-Kahn is the former head of the International Monetary Fund and is known in France as a womanizer.  It is easy to see how he might be easily framed for rape.

The story about a sexual attack, Nafissatou Diallois accusing  the head of International Monetary Fund, is really about proof, not truth, according to Jeffrey Toobin, senior CNN legal analyst. 

Nafissatou Diallois's lawyer, Cyrus Vance, believes she was raped, but that her credibility has been compromised.  Too many mistakes under pressure, too many mis-truths about the chronology of events, and then, those whoppers.   Vance believes that in a jury trial, Benjamin Brafman, Strauss-Kahn's defense attorney, will tear his client apart. 

Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin reminds us that the object of the defense is just that, to poke holes in the prosecution's case.  It is the task of the prosecutor to build that case.  Journalists, he suggests, get at the truth.  Lawyers are there to poke the holes, discredit witnesses.

In other words, it is up to Ms. Diallo's lawyer to present her story, to make her narrative sing, to make it believable.  It is what therapists accomplish every day, with every patient, encourage an honest narrative.  Patients tell a story, their life story, and it unfolds slowly, over days, sometimes weeks, in a context that is quiet, accepting, and free of judgement.  Telling the story is liberating, takes away the pain, at least some of it, anesthetizes.  Leave it here, with me, we say.  We take raw material, what hurts, and add oil.

Very few people ever lie in good therapy. 

Maybe before anyone interviews a victim of a felony, or a crime, certainly one that is high profile, surely every one of them that involves an alleged sexual assault, the precinct psychiatrist should do the questioning first.  Reduce the anxiety, eliminate the lies.  Sort out the truth before it goes public and discredits the victim.

Linda Freedman, PhD, LCSW, LMFT