DSK Effect: Hotels in New York Introduce Panic Buttons for Maids

Recent sexual scandals involving the former director of the IMF, Dominique Strauss Kahn, and Mahmoud Abdel Salam Omar, an Egyptian businessman, led the officials of hotels in New York to take action to protect employees. “Pierre” and “Sofitel” hotels will equip their maids with panic buttons to call for help if attacked by clients, writes The Wall Street Journal.

The officials of the mentioned hotels claim that “anyone who comes to New York and stays at the hotel should be aware that staff in charge of cleaning is equipped with a button that can be pressed immediately if attacked”.

Pierre Hotel spokesman said that staff in charge of cleaning will have alarms similar to those used by the elderly to alert a security office.

In order to protect the maids, changing the law it is taken into consideration so that all hotels in New York provide their staff with such equipment.

The decision comes after the former director of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was arrested last month in New York on charges sexual assaulting a chambermaid at the Sofitel Hotel.

Earlier this week, a prominent Egyptian businessman Mahmoud Abdel-Salam Omar, was also accused of assaulting a maid, who managed to escape only after giving him a fake phone number.