Lawyers for Dominique Strauss Kahn said it was "misleading and deceitful" for lawyers for his sexual assault accuser, Naifssatou Diallo, to leak a hospital report documenting her injuries to a French newspaper. The report documents her injuries after the alleged May 14 attempted rape, and explicitly states, "Cause of the injuries: assault. Rape," according to a translation of the French newspaper L'Express. Diallo's legal team didn't confirm releasing the report, but said its contents disproved Strauss-Kahn's lawyers' suggestion that a sexual encounter between the two was consensual. "The medical records are pretty powerful," lawyer Kenneth Thompson told Reuters. "Forensics don't lie. That's the bottom line."

But Benjamin Brafman and William Taylor, the attorneys representing Strauss-Kahn, released a statement condemning the report's release, and saying it didn't prove a forced encounter. The injuries described in the report--redness around Diallo's vagina and an injury to her shoulder--have been described in detail in Diallo's civil suit against Strauss-Kahn. But Brafman and Taylor rejected that description. "The hospital report's conclusion is based almost exclusively on the word of the complaining witness, who has been proven, time and again, not to be credible," their statement said. "The physical descriptions of the complainant in the medical reports are not injuries at all, and are common conditions consistent with many possible causes other than a sexual assault, including consensual sexual activity days before the incident." 

Strauss Kahn is due back in criminal court next Tuesday, where it is widely expected Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance will announce whether he will continue to pursue criminal sexual assault charges against the former International Monetary Fund director.

Want to add to this story? Let us know in comments or send an email to the author at amartin at theatlantic dot com. You can share ideas for stories on the Open Wire.
Adam Martin