Roman Polanski still being hounded by L.A. County prosecutors

With the state Legislature forced to make dramatic cuts in the prison budget and a three-judge federal panel having recently ordered California lawmakers to release as many as 40,000 inmates in response to the scandalous overcrowding of the California state prison system, it seems like an especially inauspicious time for the L.A. County district attorney's office to be spending some of our few remaining tax dollars seeing if it can finally, after all these years, put Roman Polanski behind bars.

As you've probably heard, the French-born filmmaker, who won a best director Oscar in absentia for the 2002 film "The Pianist," was arrested by Swiss police late Saturday as he arrived to accept an award at the Zurich Film Festival. At the request of the L.A. County district attorney's office, Polanski has been placed in custody -- the official term is "provisional detention for extradition'' -- awaiting a U.S. decision to make a formal extradition request.

Polanski has been living in France for the past three decades, directing films and raising a family with actress Emanuelle Seigner. He has been a fugitive from justice in the U.S. since 1978, when he fled the country rather than stand charges of having unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl. The case has been a cause celebre for years, with charges and counter-charges rocketing back and forth, many involving the controversial efforts of the original presiding judge to put Polanski safely away behind bars. It added another dramatic chapter to a life of tragedy for the filmmaker, who fled the Krakow ghetto during the Nazi occupation not long after his mother was sent to the gas chambers. In 1969, his wife, Sharon Tate, then pregnant with Polanski's child, was murdered by the Charles Manson family at a hillside home in Los Angeles. 

Meanwhile, Polanski's victim, Samantha Geimer, long ago announced that she had forgiven the filmmaker for his transgressions and supported various efforts to have the case against him dismissed. I don't think that you'd find many people who would approve of Polanski's behavior, which was disgusting -- he drugged his victim with champagne and Quaaludes before raping her during a 1977 photo session at Jack Nicholson's house.

But at a time when California is shredding the safety net that protects the poor and the unemployed, not to mention the budget of the public school system, you'd hope that L.A. County prosecutors had better things to do than cause an international furor by hounding a film director for a 32-year-old sex crime, especially one that Polanski's victim wants to put behind her. As Marina Zenovich's 2008 documentary, "Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired," ably chronicled, the original prosecution of Polanski was marred by all sorts of embarrassing missteps and strange behavior, largely by Laurence Rittenband, the original presiding judge. 

Still, actions have consequences, and Polanski's sins have not been forgotten. He has been barred from returning to the U.S. and prevented from traveling to other countries, including England, because of extradition issues. His career has clearly suffered from his inability to work in Hollywood, where he made such celebrated films as "Chinatown" and "Rosemary's Baby." He has been embraced by many -- having won a number of awards over the years -- but also shunned by a number of detractors. As he put it in his autobiography: "I am widely regarded, I know, as an evil, profligate dwarf."

But he also has his stout defenders, notably French Minister of Culture Frederic Mitterrand, who said over the weekend that he was "dumbfounded" by Polanski's arrest in Switzerland, adding that he "strongly regrets that a new ordeal is being inflicted on someone who has already experienced so many of them."

In the coming weeks, the Polanski affair will no doubt become a tabloid sensation, with op-ed moralists, excitable bloggers and the Glenn Becks of the world noisily weighing in on the propriety of his possible prosecution. Some will say Polanski is a predator whose punishment is long overdue. Others will argue that it's the height of  folly to be stalking a 76-year-old man who has admitted his guilt and was long ago forgiven by his victim.

We live in an age that is so thoroughly post-modern that you can find an obvious literary antecedent for nearly every seamy media storyline. The same goes for the Polanski case, which is full of echoes of "Les Miserables," the classic Victor Hugo novel about Jean Valjean, an ex-con trying to turn his life around who is being obsessively tracked and hunted down by the Parisian police inspector Javert.

Hugo's story is a tragedy, as is the life story of Polanski, who was a fugitive as a boy and is now a fugitive as an old man. Whether the L.A. County district attorney office has its way or not, it is not a story that can have a happy ending. I think Polanski has already paid a horrible, soul-wrenching price for the infamy surrounding his actions. The real tragedy is that he will always, till his death, be snubbed and stalked and confronted by people who think the price he has already paid isn't enough.

Video: Roman Polanski in "Chinatown."

Photo of Roman Polanski by Gerard Julien/AFP/Getty Images.

Comments

[Thomas Aquinas]

"If you are under 13 years of age you may read this message board, but you may not participate."

But you may, of course, post on Mr. Polanski's message board.

[Good Wrench]

Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13 year old girl. Now, you're telling me that the Criticism that he's endured over that fact for the last 30 years are punishment enough? That because he's not able to travel the world is Punishment? Or, are you justifying his actions because he was a Survivor of the Holocaust? Does that mean that Surviving the holocaust should entail those victims rights to Pedophilia and other crimes? As far as the Price he's paid?.. He ran to France to avoid the paying the Price. And now, he's got to live upto it. I don't care if his Victim's forgiven him, I don't care if the Pope forgives him, he commited a crime, and he's got to pay for that. And, as far as comparing this to "Les Miserable", you have got to be seriously demented to think myself or other people would feel sympathy for a Self Admitted Pederast.

[FRANK]

Pathetic Polanski sympathizing article. Regardless of the victims feelings, the time that has passed, the state of the California penal systems, and the sadness in Polanski's life, heinous crimes against children need to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

[mickee glicee]

Sure he admitted his guilt, but then he skipped out on his punishment.

Why does it have to be stated over and over that this pervert drugged then raped a thirteen year old girl?
So the guy is old, big deal.

He raped a child.
He raped a child.
He raped a child.

[chris]

I fully agree with decision to release some offenders. However, like most people, I would not agree to release pedophiles and I am not sure why Polanski should be excused from his horrible transgressions against a 13 year old girl. It does not matter how much time has passed or how famous he is, the man drugged and raped her both vaginally and anally.

[Matt]

Or is the real tragedy is that he got away ran away from his legal troubles while so many others with far fewer means are serving jail time for less offensive reasons? Or is it that the Samantha Geimer is the text book case of victims of sexual crimes shutting up because of social pressures not to speak out? There are far bigger tragedies in this story then a guy who was forced to live in France, and could only make a few million rather than hundreds of millions. Cry me a river.

[Caren]

Jean Valjean's crime was stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister and her starving child.

Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13 year old girl. The fact that she has grown up and managed to survive that rape does not make the crime any less repugnant.

At the time, Polanski faced a very light sentence. He still ran away rather than serve any time for his crime. If he committed the same crime today, he'd go away for years and be on a sex offender registry for life.

Sorry, but his art does not excuse his crime.

[Patterico]

I never thought I'd see the day when the L.A. Times published a piece arguing that it is too costly to pursue justice for the anal rape of a 13-year-old child.

The girl's grand jury testimony speaks for itself:

A. Then he lifted up my legs and went in through my anus.

Q. What do you mean by that?

A. He put his penis in my butt.

. . . .

Q. Do you know whether he had a climax?

A. Yes.

Q. And how do you know that?

A. Because I could kind of feel it and it was in my underwear. It was in my underwear. It was on my butt and stuff.

Q. When you say that, you believe that he climaxed in your anus?

A. Yes.

Q. What does climax mean?

A. That his semen came out.

Q. Do you know what semen is?

A. Yes.

Q. Did you see some semen or feel some semen?

A. I felt it.

Q. Where did you feel it?

A. I felt it on the back of my behind and in my underwear when I put them on.

The girl testified that she allowed this to happen because she was afraid of him, adding that Polanski had her take part of a Quaalude, which she washed down with a swallow of champagne.

To me, this crime seems like it's worth spending money on.

[Julie]

"The real tragedy is that he will always, till his death, be snubbed and stalked and confronted by people who think the price he has already paid isn't enough. "

I'm sorry, but this is one of the most idiotic things to have ever come from a supposedly professional journalist. Tell me exactly what price Roman Polanski has paid. For the past 30+ years, he has lived in the lap of luxury in Europe, been treated like a celebrity, and hailed by a Hollywood that refuses to see the man as the sicko that he really is. It is absolutely mind-blowing at how so many people are willing to forgive a person's transgressions (and that word seems like a poor euphemism for Polanski's crime of DRUGGING and RAPING a child) as long as said person is a 'genius.'

[Heather]

It is not that he is not "allowed" to travel to the US. It is that he fled the US and knows he will be arrested if he returns. In fact, the US would very much like for him to return so that we can try and convict him as a pedophile and rapist.

He drugged and raped a little girl. Her forgiveness of his crime has no bearing on his guilt or his need to stand trial for drugging and raping a little girl.