Diallo, Justice, and Light

In an angst-filled conversation regarding his own duties to it, Russell Crowe’s character in the movie "Gladiator" says to his Emperor, “I have seen much of the rest of the world. It is brutal, and cruel, and dark. Rome is the light.”Despite falling far short of its ideals, and even in the face of an arguable decline, it is still possible to substitute “America” for “Rome” in that sentence and have it be painfully, desperately true for much of the rest of the world.America is still the light, and New York is still its embodiment. The gift from France in her harbor was stunning not only in its descriptive brilliance but also in its uncanny timing. The woman holds a torch— the symbolism is so perfect it could never have existed in fiction. And her placement coincided perfectly with the greatest influx of immigrants the world has ever known.Many more stand in lines at JFK now than behold the torch, but still they come.  Nafissatou Diallo was one of them.  In her, the Manhattan DA’s office encountered an individual much like millions of others who claw their way to that thin, little island and then navigate it any way they can. As we now know, getting there was messy. She lied on a visa application. She was taught, apparently, to lie convincingly about sexual violence. Whether she was actually brutalized and raped in her native country has been challenged in light of some admitted fabrication, but I have little doubt she suffered greatly in a manner similar to what she was taught to concoct, and was willing to do anything she had to do in order to escape where she was.This should shock no one. The journey to America— to New York— has always been characterized as often as not with deception. With bribery. With fraud, abuse, and soul-selling, desperate behavior. I have no idea what my great-grandparents did for the chance to float past that torch, but I’d be slow to judge them for it.The reach for America also attracts desperate people who have been broken by events and reshaped in ways that make them difficult at times to understand, defend, and support.  Cultural barriers, distrust of authority, and a constant fear of the truth itself are not uncommon in people for whom candor and innocence have been met with brutality and perfidy.Surviving in New York has been apparently messy for Ms. Diallo as well. I prosecuted sex crimes in the Bronx, where she lives, for two years.  I saw the realities of living there on blue collar income, and got a glimpse of what people did to make ends meet. Diallo defrauded the housing authority, we know. She had shady friends who used her for her bank accounts.  Yes, that happens in New York. Diallo got by— hustling, surviving, call it whatever you want— the way so many do in a city capable of bringing the strongest, most resourceful people to begging knees. But she was making ends meet, in all of her imperfect, rule-bending glory, working long and difficult hours as a maid and raising a child.And then she encountered Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and chose to report what he did to her. And suddenly the rules she was bending or breaking mattered much more than perhaps she ever imagined.Those familiar with me will be unsurprised to hear that I believe Diallo was attacked by DSK. As we know from the blunt, blind force of DNA, a sexual encounter between them took place.  The only issue is whether she consented to it and then lied.  Is it strictly possible that Diallo had— or quickly formed— a vile and remarkably elaborate plan to frame a renowned economist, seeking a future payoff as some adjunct of the criminal justice response?  A woman who reportedly cannot read or write in any language?  And further, does this evil turn of events merely dovetail by coincidence with the several other allegations of sexual aggressiveness and/or violence leveled against Mr. Strass-Kahn in several places around the globe?For better or worse, I know far too much about sexual violence and those who commit it to credit that scenario as anything other than fantastic.Regardless, the decision to dismiss the case, while arguable, is not one I'm criticizing.  I am familiar with the challenges the DA faced under New York law, particularly the necessarily rushed presentation of the case to a grand jury. I applaud the office for what appears to be exemplary ethical behavior. My only criticism of NYDA concerns the meticulously detailed and humiliating public motion to dismiss the indictment. Unintentional the humiliation may have been, but hurtful it was nonetheless.  Perhaps, as the motion painstakingly details, the case was not deserving of prosecution. But neither was Diallo deserving of such a detailed public lambasting.  I am aware of no legal necessity for that level of detail in seeking the dismissal of an indicted case.Of course, the DA cited more than just Ms. Diallo’s recent past. Also detailed was apparently odd behavior and reversals that undermined the faith prosecutors had in her.  But again, this is what we sometimes see in people when unimaginable circumstances have driven them here, and we would surely fare no better were we driven elsewhere.  Couple that with cultural and language barriers, with how our minds build and recall memories in traumatic situations, and I believe explaining the inconsistencies might have been worth fighting for in a court of law.  But in fairness, it was not my case.The point is that Diallo was rendered incredible by her choices, but many of those choices were driven by circumstances most of us live happily ignorant of.  I'm not excusing whatever illegal behavior she may have engaged in over time, or the lack of candor with the DA.  She is rightfully responsible for her actions, but not beyond what is remotely foreseeable.  I doubt she ever thought those actions would also make her tragically powerless when it came to standing up to an attack in the very country she sought out for asylum and a better life.Upon Diallo, as upon all, New York has bestowed gifts.  From Diallo, as from all, it has exacted a price in return. What’s perverse is not necessarily this harsh but typical and time-honored agreement. What’s perverse is the bizarre extent to which the cost of getting there and getting by has also denied her simple justice.