DSK case needs a heroic victim
Thursday, May 26, 2011
This article (link below) by a woman who is a law professor and former prosecutor of sex crimes is very good, in my opinion. We should be bending every hope toward the young West African chambermaid who testifies that she was violently assaulted by the former head of the International Monetary Fund. Powerful lawyers are already preparing the defense, and the presence of apparently incontrovertible DNA evidence will make it necessary to go for the traditional excuse that “she asked for it.”
As this article makes clear, not only will this hitherto unknown woman in a thankless job have to endure repeated attacks on her character and truthfulness, but she will also have to withstand offers of a payoff from very persuasive and very overbearing people.
Two experienced, high-level women prosecutors have been called in to work on the case, Joan Illuzzi-Orbon and Ann P. Prunty. This is encouraging, since the defense has already hired a firm (with the unlikely name of Guidepost Solutions) to dig up as much dirt on the maid as they can.
Most people are not willing to expend the effort of imagination required to understand what this woman has gone through and, even more important, what she will have to go through. Some will say that she should be glad to get a large sum of money. Her own family may be urging her to settle. But this could turn out to be a historic, game-changing case. The fate of millions of voiceless women around the world hangs in the balance. I will be praying every day for her to be strong.
http://womensenews.org/story/rape/110525/if-money-talks-dsk-scandal-could-go-poof
