New york,July 26:THE HOTEL maid who claims former IMF boss Dominique Strauss- Kahn sexually assaulted her in a New York hotel room has broken her silence to demand justice.
Nafissatou Diallo said she had chosen to go public and waive her right to anonymity so that people know the truth about what happened in Strauss- Kahn’s luxury suite on May 14.
The 32- year- old said she saw Strauss- Kahn appear naked in front of her when she opened the door to his suite and he started to act like “ a crazy man”. “ You’re beautiful,” she reported Strauss- Kahn as saying, and said he attacked her despite her protestations.
“ I said, ‘ Sir, stop this. I don’t want to lose my job’. But he said, ‘ You’re not going to lose your job’,” Diallo said.
“ I push him. I get up. I wanted to scare him. I said, ‘ Look, there is my supervisor right there’,” she told Newsweek. But Strauss- Kahn said no one was there to hear, she said, and he went on to force her to perform a sex act on him.
Diallo said she thought she was going to be killed in the days after she made the accusations and said she is angry that “ because of him they call me a prostitute”. “ I never want to be in public but I have no choice,” she said in another interview to ABC News, adding: “ Now, I have to be in public. I have to, for myself. I have to tell the truth.” “ I want justice. I want him to go to jail,” she said in the ABC interview on Sunday. “ I want him to know that there are some places you cannot use your money, you cannot use your power when you do something like this.” She said she hopes God punishes the man, who had been tipped as the next French president.
“ We are poor, but we are good,” she said. “ I don’t think about money.” The hotel maid said she did not know her alleged attacker’s high profile until she watched the morning news the day after the incident. “ I watched Channel 7 and they say this is ( the) guy, I don’t know, and he is going to be the next president of France. And I think they are going to kill me,” she told Newsweek.
Diallo said she is angry at claims published in The New York Post that she was working as a part- time prostitute. “ Because of him they call me a prostitute,” Diallo, who is suing the newspaper, said.
The interviews with Newsweek and ABC News mark the first time the 32- year- old Guinean has been publicly identified since she shocked the world with allegations that Strauss- Kahn sexually assaulted her.
Strauss- Kahn has denied the charges against him. In a statement on Sunday, his lawyers called the interviews “ an unseemly circus” designed to inflame public opinion and a lastditch effort by the maid to extract money from him.
RECOUNTING THE ORDEAL
“ I said,‘ Sir, stop this. I don’t want to lose my job’. But he said,‘ You’re not going to lose your job’.”
“ I push him. I get up. I wanted to scare him. I said,‘ Look, there is my supervisor right there’. But he said no one was there to hear.”
“ The next day, I was watching the news and they said he’s going to be the next president of France. I said,‘ Oh, my God.
They’re going to kill me. I’m going to die’.”
“ I want justice. I want him to go to jail. I want him to know there are some places you cannot use your power, you cannot use your money.”
“ I never want to be in public, but I have no choice.”
“ God is my witness, I’m telling the truth. God knows that. And Strauss- Kahn knows that.”
THE SORDID AFFAIR
MAY 13, 2011:
Dominque Strauss- Kahn, 62, checks into Manhattan’s Sofitel hotel
MAY 14:
He allegedly sexually assaults chambermaid Nafissatou Diallo, 32. Diallo complains to her supervisor who calls the police. About 4.40 pm, Strauss- Kahn is pulled off a Paris- bound flight and arrested
MAY 18:
Diallo testifies at an in- camera grand jury hearing; Strauss- Kahn resigns as MD of the IMF
MAY 19:
Strauss- Kahn is formally indicted by the grand jury but granted bail
JUNE 6:
Strauss- Kahn pleads not guilty at Manhattan criminal court
JULY 24:
Diallo waives her right to anonymity and gives her first public interviews