Strauss-Kahn allegedly tied to hooker ring

PARIS, Nov. 16 (UPI) -- Former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn is being investigated by police looking into a call-girl ring in France, officials said.

The French weekly news magazine L'Express reported French police are examining reports Strauss-Kahn is linked to an $800-a-night ring in northern France that allegedly dispatched prostitutes to Washington and other international capitals to entertain Strauss-Kahn when he attended meetings, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday.

Police indicated they expected to interview Strauss-Kahn within a few weeks.

The news magazine reported in February 2009, after speaking at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris, Strauss-Kahn had lunch with several friends and their female companions, who the magazine said were prostitutes flown in from Belgium and with whom Strauss-Kahn had sex.

Strauss-Kahn's lawyers said their client was being victimized by a "media lynching" and called reports about the alleged sex scandal "dangerous and malicious insinuations."

While hiring a prostitute isn't illegal in France, Strauss-Kahn could face corruption charges if a third party paid for the alleged encounters, the Times reported.

In May, Strauss-Kahn was arrested in New York on several sexual assault-related charges. Prosecutors later dropped the charges because they doubted the reliability of the accuser, a New York hotel maid. In France, he was accused of attacking a French journalist but those charges also were dropped.