The 32-year-old maid is under intense scrutiny after New York prosecutors were forced to tell a court on Friday that they had found holes in her story that may seriously damage her credibility as a witness.
Reports in New York tabloids alleged that she provided sex for hotel guests in return for money, and that Mr Strauss-Kahn may have misunderstood the situation on May 14.
Mr Strauss-Kahn, who at the weekend was enjoying freedom without bail, is charged with trying to rape her after she arrived to clean his Manhattan Sofitel suite and forcing her to give him oral sex.
But the case against him is hanging by a thread. Reports claim that soon after the incident, she was recorded telling a drug dealer in Arizona: "Don't worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I'm doing".
But what is certain is that the maid told detectives and prosecutors that afterwards "she fled to an area of the main hallway" and "waited there until she observed the defendant leave suite 2806". French newspapers reported on Sunday that the maid married the drug dealer, a Gambian national, last year.
A letter filed to court by Cyrus Vance jr, the Manhattan district attorney, said: "The complainant testified to this version of events when questioned in the Grand Jury about her actions".
However she "has since admitted that this account was false" and that she went on to clean another room, and returned to clean Mr Strauss-Kahn's suite, before reporting the incident to her supervisor.
Professor Kevin Johnson, the dean of the University of California's law school and an expert in immigration law, said: "The department of homeland security could try to reopen her asylum case on the basis that she appears to have lied in her application, and ultimately say that she should be removed from the country. This is an extraordinary case ... I can imagine the department going after her". Read on and comment » | Jon Swaine, New York | Sunday, July 03, 2011
