NEW YORK — The head of the International Monetary Fund was charged early Sunday in connection with the alleged sexual assault of a housekeeper at a Manhattan hotel Saturday, a New York police spokesman said.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, 62, who had been removed from a Paris-bound flight in New York minutes before takeoff Saturday, was questioned by the New York Police Department’s special-victims office and arrested at 2:15 a.m. Sunday on charges of criminal sex act, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment, a spokesman said.
Strauss-Kahn’s attorney, Benjamin Brafman, said Sunday his client has denied all charges and would plead not guilty. His arraignment was postponed until today after additional evidence was sought including DNA samples from his fingernails and skin, The New York Times reported.
The allegations create immediate uncertainty for the Washington-based IMF, which has been playing an important role in stabilizing the global economy amid the financial crisis.
The IMF on Sunday named John Lipsky acting managing director. Lipsky, an economist and former vice chairman at JPMorgan, has been first deputy managing director at the IMF since 2006. An IMF spokesman said the organization’s standard procedures dictate that he assume the acting managing-director role when the managing director is “not in D.C.” The IMF said Lipsky also would chair an informal board meeting late Sunday afternoon to update directors on the situation.
A spokesman said IMF deputy managing director Nemat Shafik, who oversees the group’s work in various European Union countries, would attend today’s meeting in Brussels, where Strauss-Kahn had been heading when he was arrested.
The arrest also promises to stir up politics in France, where Strauss-Kahn is widely thought to be considering challenging French President Nicolas Sarkozy in next year’s election. Polls have indicated that he would have a good chance of defeating Sarkozy.
“He won’t be able to be a candidate for the Socialist Party presidential primary,” Jacques Attali, a fellow Socialist leader, told French reporters.
Sarkozy’s government spokesman, Francois Baroin, said Strauss-Kahn should benefit from the innocent-until- proven-guilty principle and called on political figures and commentators to use caution in dealing with his case.
Socialist Party leader Martine Aubry acknowledged, meanwhile, that news of Strauss-Kahn’s arrest had arrived in Paris “like a thunderbolt” during the night, throwing Socialist militants into disarray.
But like Baroin, she urged the country to withhold judgment until the situation in New York becomes clearer.
The alleged sexual assault occurred around 1 p.m., police told The Associated Press.
The housekeeper told authorities she entered Strauss- Kahn’s suite at the luxury Sofitel hotel not far from Manhattan’s Times Square and that he attacked her.
