The arrest of IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn and possible rival to French President Nicolas Sarkozy on allegations of rape has made it cool to hate France again, particularly after the reaction of French elites to Strauss-Khan's treatment.
Though horrified by those alleged crimes, the French press and political elite on Monday seemed perhaps more scandalized still by the images of Mr. Strauss-Kahn's brusque treatment by the New York police, and his exposure in the American media.
“I found that image to be incredibly brutal, violent and cruel,” the former justice minister Elisabeth Guigou told France-Info radio on Monday, referring to widely published photographs of a beleaguered-looking Mr. Strauss-Kahn, handcuffed and led by several New York police officers. “I am happy that we do not have the same judicial system.”
As justice minister, Ms. Guigou, now a parliamentarian, oversaw the passage of a law prohibiting the publication of photographs of handcuffed criminal suspects.
“I don't see what the publication of images of this type adds,” she said.
Asked about Ms. Guigou's remarks, Eva Joly, a well-known French magistrate who once brought charges against Mr. Strauss-Kahn for corruption (of which he was later acquitted), agreed that “these are very violent images.” Ms. Joly, who is now a leader of the French Green Party expected to run in next year’s presidential election, added that this sort of media spectacle might be “more violent for a celebrity than for an unknown person,” but noted that the American justice system “doesn't distinguish between the director of the I.M.F. and any other suspect. It's the idea of equal rights.”
Likewise, Bernard Henri-Levy expressed outrage that anyone would treat his friend, the rich dude, like anyone else accused of a violent crime, especially since a refined gentleman couldn't possibly be guilty of raping some "chambermaid." I'm not a fan of the "perp walk" myself, and Strauss-Khan is innocent until proven guilty, but frankly, his friends aren't doing him many favors.
At any rate, the notion that Americans are fans of hard justice even for powerful elites would be great if it were true, but the reality is that the American system of justice is still largely focused on punishing the poorest and least powerful in society and that the politically connected and wealthy can afford a better quality of justice than everyone else if they ever have to face the authorities at all. In America, Strauss-Khan just doesn't have the same kind of institutional protection as an executive at Goldman Sachs, a member of the Bush legal team, or frankly just a teenager at a northeastern elite college getting busted for coke by campus cops instead of the local police. Whether you believe Strauss-Khan's "perp walk," was unnecessary theater, it's certainly not an indication that our criminal-justice system is blind to the influence of powerful elites.
