Strauss-Kahn enjoys being free of house arrest as more questions are raised about his accuser

With the sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn hanging by a thread, damning revelations have emerged about his accuser, whose mounting credibility problems prompted the ex-IMF chief’s release from house arrest.

Buoyed by a New York judge’s order a day earlier to end all restrictions on him except foreign travel, Mr. Strauss-Kahn enjoyed his first full day of freedom on Saturday as prosecutors scrambled to salvage some sort of case against the once high-flying French politician.

He left his rented townhouse in Lower Manhattan with his wife, Anne Sinclair, for several hours in the afternoon, chased by an army of photographers and news teams.

It was a stunning reversal of fortune for a man who spent days locked up in New York’s tough Rikers Island jail in May.

While the charges against the 62-year-old stand, the case has nearly imploded after prosecutors acknowledged their investigations of the accuser, a Guinea-born hotel maid, found she lied to a grand jury about the case.

In a letter to defense lawyers, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said the woman had provided a “false” narrative of her life −including a gang rape that she later admitted never occurred −as part of her application process for US asylum.

Among other details gleaned about the maid were her possible links to criminal activities, including drug dealing and money laundering, a law enforcement official told The New York Times.

Within a day of the alleged rape attempt, the maid was recorded speaking on the phone with a boyfriend jailed for possessing 400 pounds of marijuana and discussing the benefits of pursuing charges against Mr. Strauss-Kahn, according to the newspaper.

When the conversation was translated from Fulani, the maid’s native language, investigators became concerned.

“She says words to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I’m doing,’” the Times quoted one of the officials as saying.

The paper said the man was one of several individuals who made multiple cash deposits totaling around $100,000 into the woman’s bank account during the last two years.

Investigators once trumpeted the woman as a devout Muslim who immediately reported that Mr. Strauss-Kahn, a steward of the world economy from the French elite, sprang naked from the bathroom and forced her to perform oral sex.

Her own lawyer came to her defense on Friday, portraying her as a frightened, illiterate woman who remained a victim, her body badly bruised in the encounter.

“The victim here may have made some mistakes, but that doesn’t mean she’s not a rape victim,” said Kenneth Thompson.

After his arrest, Mr. Strauss-Kahn was paraded handcuffed before cameras in a “perp walk” that drew outrage in France, where the American tradition was viewed as barbaric.

The sensational twist raised hopes among Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s ardent supporters that the case will collapse and the Socialist party favorite will return to frontline politics, possibly even as a candidate to challenge French President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012 elections.

In a hint of just how possible Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s bid may be, fellow socialist Segolene Royal, a candidate in the presidential vote, said she had no problem delaying the process to make room for him.

But the current deadline for declaring in the Socialist Party primary is July 13 −five days before Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s next scheduled court appearance in New York.

And authorities will keep his passport pending possible trial, meaning he cannot travel outside of the United States, though his $1 million bail and $5 million bond will now be returned.

Despite the maid’s shattered credibility, Mr. Vance vowed to continue the investigations until prosecutors had uncovered all the facts.

“Today’s proceedings did not dismiss the indictment or any of the charges against the defendant,” he stressed.

Legal analysts, however, said the case was likely dead in the water and would be dismissed.

According to the accuser’s initial grand jury testimony, she fled Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s luxury hotel suite immediately after the May 14 attack and waited in the hallway before informing a supervisor.

But, prosecutors revealed, the 32-year-old subsequently changed her story, admitting she actually cleaned another room and even returned to start cleaning Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s suite before alerting her bosses.

Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s attorneys, William Taylor and Benjamin Brafman, said the disclosures “only further confirm that he will be fully exonerated.”

Outside the courtroom, the maid’s lawyer, Kenneth Thompson, admitted his client had made “some mistakes,” but insisted forensic evidence would prove Mr. Strauss-Kahn was guilty of a brutal sexual assault.

Neighbors in the accuser’s Bronx neighborhood, including many fellow Guineans, were philosophical.

“Maybe she lied. It just ends up hurting all Guineans if people have less than good intentions,” said Tidiane Ba, speaking in French. “But we have to let the courts do their job.”

Others offered her their full support.

“I do not think she lied because a Fulani woman cannot lie,” said a young restaurant waiter who declined to reveal his name.

(Sara Ghasemilee, a senior editor at Al Arabiya English, can be reached at: [email protected])