Metro

‘Gay hookup’ link in French scholar’s Manhattan hotel room death: sources

Cops found gay-hookup Web sites on the laptop computer of a married French scholar whose naked corpse was found in a posh Midtown hotel room, law-enforcement sources said yesterday.

Richard Descoings, 53, director of the prestigious Paris Institute of Political Studies — and a friend of French President Nicolas Sarkozy — was “really into men,” his widow told cops, according to the sources.

Nadia Marik-Descoings flew in from France yesterday and told cops she was aware of her husband’s homosexual interests “before she met and married him,” the sources added.

Detectives are looking to question two men who visited Descoings’ room Monday evening.

Descoings’ body was discovered Tuesday afternoon after he failed to appear at a conference at Columbia University.

An autopsy performed yesterday was inconclusive pending toxicology tests.

Descoings’ seventh-floor Michelangelo Hotel room on West 51st Street wasn’t broken into and there were no signs of trauma on the body. Alcohol and prescription drugs were found in the room.

Descoings’ laptop and cellphone were found on a third-floor ledge, possibly tossed from his window.

Sarkozy yesterday paid homage to his friend, who he said gave underprivileged students the chance to study at the revered Paris university.