News of the separation followed weeks of media speculation that the
relationship was under pressure and reports that Mr Strauss-Kahn was
depressed at his spectacular fall from grace.
“He’s in a bad way. It’s very sad,” said a person who knows Mr
Strauss-Kahn and recently saw him said. “He’s mostly just at home on his own
while Anne is out and about with her new job. He’s shunned by everybody.”
Another friend described him as “depressed and destroyed”.
Miss Sinclair last week agreed to a photo shoot alone for the front page of
Paris Match magazine – a sign she was preparing the ground for news of the
separation, observers said.
Once hotly tipped to be France’s next Socialist President, Mr Strauss-Kahn has
seen his career disintegrate since his arrest in New York in May 2011 on
charges of attempting to rape a hotel maid. The criminal case was dropped
over concerns about the credibility of Nafissatou Diallo, 33, but he
admitted that a sex act had taken place. The maid is now pursuing a civil
case against him after the Bronx Supreme Court threw out his claims of
diplomatic immunity.
Miss Sinclair stood steadfastly by her husband during the US ordeal, but is
said to have been less supportive amid mounting allegations in France.
These included claims by a French writer that he had tried to rape her in a
Paris flat. Prosecutors ruled that there was sufficient evidence to press
sexual harassment charges but could not pursue the case as the events took
place more than three years previously.
Then prosecutors opened an investigation into a prostitution ring operating
out of Lille, northern France in which Mr Strauss-Kahn is implicated.
He faces “aggravated pimping” charges as prosecutors seek to determine the
nature of his relationship with prostitutes when he attended sex parties in
northern France, Paris and Washington in 2010 and 2011. The charges carry a
maximum 20-year prison term.
Last month the inquiry was widened to include a possible gang rape charge
after a prostitute told them Mr Strauss-Kahn and friends had forced her to
have sex in a group when she came to Washington to meet him in December
2010. The woman has not filed a formal complaint.
Another call girl told investigators that Mr Strauss-Kahn and his male friends
treated orgies “like cattle markets”, and he referred to women as
“equipment” in one message to a friend.
He denies any knowledge that the women at the orgies were prostitutes — his
lawyer has argued that “they were all naked at the time” – and he has told
police there was “no brutality” involved.
Also under investigation are: Jean-Christophe Lagarde, a former police chief
from Lille ; David Roquet, head of a subsidiary of the Eiffage building
giant ; and another businessman called Fabrice Paszkowski , who is said to
have regularly exchanged mobile phone text messages with Mr Strauss-Kahn.
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