Richard Descoings, a French academic and director of the prestigious Institute of Political Studies in Paris, was found dead in a Manhattan hotel on Tuesday. Police have not ruled out foul play because Descoings’s seventh-floor room was found in disarray and some of his belongings were found on a third-floor landing. Drugs and alcohol were also found in the room. Descoings, an advisor to France’s political leaders, was in New York to attend a conference at Columbia University.
