Hotel maid can pursue lawsuit against DS...

Hotel maid can pursue lawsuit against DS...

Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, former head of the International Monetary Fund.

A New York hotel maid's sexual assault lawsuit against French bigwig Dominique Strauss-Kahn can go forward, a Bronx judge ruled Tuesday.

State Supreme Court Justice Douglas McKeon decided that the former International Monetary Fund leader is not entitled to diplomatic immunity.

He derided Strauss-Kahn's claim of international protection as the legal equivalent of a "Hail Mary" football pass.

McKeon noted that the disgraced politician didn't cite diplomatic immunity last year when faced with criminal charges for the May 2011 encounter and pointed out that Strauss-Kahn resigned from the IMF long before he was sued.

"If Mr. Strauss-Kahn was entitled to absolute immunity, as he contends, there was ample opportunity before now to assert it," the judge wrote in a 12-page decision.

The maid, Nafissatou Diallo, 33, says Strauss-Kahn, 63, tried to rape her. But Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance declined to prosecute the one-time French presidential candidate due to doubts about her trustworthiness.

In August, Diallo sued Strauss-Kahn in the Bronx, her home borough.

"We are extremely pleased with Judge McKeon's well reasoned and articulate decision recognizing that Strauss-Kahn is not entitled to immunity," said Douglas Wigdor, Diallo's lawyer. "We have said all along that StraussKahn's desperate plea for immunity was a tactic designed to delay these proceedings, and we now look forward to holding him accountable for the brutal sexual assault that he committed."

Diallo says Strauss-Kahn chased her around his suite at the Sofitel hotel in idtown, dragged her into the bathroom and forced her to perform oral sex on him.

But the ex-finance chief's lawyers claim he did nothing illegal and is being unfairly targeted.

"We are disappointed that the ourt did not grant our motion to dismiss the civil suit," attorneys William Taylor II, Hugh Campbell and Amit Mehta said in a joint statement Tuesday. "He is determined to fight the claims brought against him, and we are confident that he will prevail."

dbeekman@nydailynews.com