Roman Polanski Arrested

[Lemdog]

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090927/D9AVJSLG0.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ZURICH (AP) - Director Roman Polanski has been taken into custody by Swiss police on a 31-year-old U.S. arrest warrant, organizers of the Zurich Film Festival said Sunday.

The organizers said in a statement that Polanski was detained by police Saturday in relation to a 1978 U.S. request, without giving details. Zurich police couldn't immediately confirm the information.

Polanski fled the United States in 1978, a year after pleading guilty to unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl.

The 76-year-old director of such classic films as "Chinatown" and "Rosemary's Baby" recently sought dismissal of his case on grounds of misconduct by the now-deceased judge who had arranged a plea bargain and then reneged on it.

Polanski has lived for the past three decades in France, where his career has continued to flourish. He received a directing Oscar in absentia for the 2002 movie "The Pianist."

Festival organizers said Polanski traveled to Switzerland to receive an award for his lifetime of work as a director.

They said Polanski's detention had caused "shock and dismay," but that they would go ahead with Sunday's planned retrospective of the director's work.

I wonder when he will be back in the U.S.

[domino harvey]

Man, fuck the authorities so hard for this

[ianungstad]

I remember reading a story about the victim in the press (just mere months ago) where she stated that she wanted the charges against Polanski to be dropped.

Terrible news. (in terms of his film career)

[aox]

Well, how does this affect The Ghost?

[GringoTex]

I remember reading a story about the victim in the press (just mere months ago) where she stated that she wanted the charges against Polanski to be dropped.

Polanski paid a a lot of coin for her endorsement.

They need to just have him serve out the original agreed-to plea bargain. Anybody would have run from the sham sentence that judge would have given him.

[Jeff]

Well, how does this affect The Ghost?

Negatively, I imagine.

Filming was completed in May though, so it should be close to being in the can at this point.

[Ted Todorov]

Apparently he travelled to Switzerland all the time and had a house there (according to the NY Times). Wonder what suddenly compelled the Swiss to arrest him?

[Cinephrenic]

This man has been through enough, he has already redeemed himself to some great films he has already done for humanity. Oh, he fucked some girl back in the 70s...blah blah. Our prosecutors need to focus on other shit.

[knives]

Poor guy is a walking Murphy's Law. I would have thought that the statue of limitations would have passed after nearly forty years though.

[Highway 61]

You know, I'd wager a guess that there isn't any poster on this board less sympathetic to Polanski than me, and even I find his sudden arrest very suspect.

Poor guy is a walking Murphy's Law. I would have thought that the statue of limitations would have passed after nearly forty years though.

I wondered the same thing. Maybe his fleeing the US set the clock back to zero?

[HerrSchreck]

Who in the Justice Dept is pushing this, I wonder?

During Bush's Justice Dept. I could see this-- but Obama's?

[Tom Hagen]

I remember reading a story about the victim in the press (just mere months ago) where she stated that she wanted the charges against Polanski to be dropped.

Polanski paid a a lot of coin for her endorsement.

They need to just have him serve out the original agreed-to plea bargain. Anybody would have run from the sham sentence that judge would have given him.

Exactly. The reason that this case is still open is because Polanski pled guilty. The Judge reneged on the plea bargain Polanski reached with the prosecution, and Polanski left the jurisdiction before he could be sentenced.

Leagally speaking, there's not much that the authorities can do with the case until Polanski is finally sentenced. It's weird that the Swiss decided to arrest him, and there were countless documented instances of judicial or prosecutorial misconduct in the prosecution of Polanski's case, but I can hardly object to state and federal authorties in the United States maintaining a policy interest in prosecuting fugitives from justice, especially when guilt has already been established.

[tajmahal]

Oh, he fucked some girl back in the 70s...blah blah.

A little balance is needed after that comment.

http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/st ... 85,00.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The case against Polanski

The victim Samantha Geimer, 45 is now a married mother-of-three who has repeatedly asked authorities to drop charges.

Ms Geimer was a starry-eyed innocent when Polanski asked her mother if he could photograph her for a fashion magazine at the Hollywood Hills home of Jack Nicholson in March 1977.
Related Coverage

After plying the youngster with champagne and drugs and taking nude pictures of her in a hot tub, Polanski had sex with the teen despite her resistance and requests to be taken home.

"We did photos with me drinking champagne," Ms Geimer testified to a grand jury. "Toward the end it got a little scary, and I realised he had other intentions and I knew I was not where I should be.

In a 2003 interview Ms Geimer said she had tried to resist Polanski's advances as he led her to a bedroom.

"I said, like, 'No, no. I don't want to go in there. No, I don't want to do this. No', and then I didn't know what else to do," she said.

"We were alone, and I didn't know what else would happen if I made a scene. So I was just scared, and after giving some resistance, I figured well, I guess I'll get to come home after this."
Polanski was later charged with rape and five other felonies before later pleading guilty to a lesser charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, partly to spare Ms Geimer the trauma of having to go through a trial.

Ms Geimer has said in a past interview she was unhappy at having to recount her experiences to police and before a grand jury.

"I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to talk to anyone or tell anyone. I just felt forced to continually tell this story," she said.

"I was so angry about it. It was like - wasn't what happened bad enough, now we got to go through every single day of my life."

Ms Geimer left Los Angeles for Hawaii in the 1980s where she has rebuilt her life with her husband with whom she has three sons.

However the enduring legal questions surrounding Polanski's flight from justice have ensured that Ms Geimer is regularly dragged reluctantly back into the public eye despite her appeals for the case to be dropped.

"I got over it a long time ago," she has said. "I wasn't prepared to carry a lot of bad feelings with me and further damage my life and continue the trauma of it."

In January, Ms Geimer filed a legal declaration in Los Angeles formally requesting that the outstanding charges against Polanski be withdrawn.

She said Los Angeles prosecutors' insistence that Polanski must return to the United States before dismissal of the case could be considered as a "cruel joke being played on me".

Polanski is being held in Geneva under a 2005 international alert issued by the US government, related to the 1978 arrest warrant.

Anyone arrested provisionally under the extradition agreement is freed after 40 days, or exceptionally 60 days, if no formal extradition request is made.

They can however subsequently be rearrested and extradited if another request is made, according to the agreement.

[Peacock]

Anyone arrested provisionally under the extradition agreement is freed after 40 days, or exceptionally 60 days, if no formal extradition request is made.

They can however subsequently be rearrested and extradited if another request is made, according to the agreement.

I suspect if no formal extradition request is made that he'll be loooong gone before they can change their minds!!!

[Highway 61]

Los Angeles DA's office arranged the arrest
Definitely seems personal. Although the conspiracy theorist in me wants to believe this was engineered to keep the Feds off the backs of Swiss banks.

[Lemmy Caution]

Statute of limitations only has to do with the bringing of charges. Some serious charges* were brought and, as Tom Hagen notes, Polanski plead guilty to one lesser charge. Ain't no statute of limitations on being a convicted fugitive. Similarly, it is irrelevant at this point (after a guilty plea) if the victim forgives (and far too late to "drop the charges").

For the record, a 44 year old Polanski took advantage of his fame/position to drug and rape a 13 year old.

As per wiki:

*Polanski was initially charged with rape by use of drugs, perversion, sodomy, lewd and lascivious act upon a child under 14, and furnishing a controlled substance (methaqualone) to a minor. These charges were dismissed under the terms of his plea bargain, and he pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.

[Cinephrenic]

For those who hasn't seen it, watch Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired.

[Antoine Doinel]

The AP's internal notes somehow spilled online, and they're speculating the Swiss are doing this to curry favor with US, especially with the whole UBS thing hanging over their heads.

[jt]

Would people be so willing to defend him if he was a plumber, or a mechanic? How about if he were a bad film director..?

Lets say Michael Bay rapes the 13 year old daughter of someone here then skips off to Europe before sentencing, are you all saying that in 10, 20, 30 years you'd all forgive him if he made some good films in the mean time? Bullshit. I'd chase the fucker to the ends of the earth. And while I feel sorry for the victim who, understandably wants to forget about the whole thing, it's not the fault of the justice department that the case is still being talked about 30 years later, it's Polanski's for running away.

I'm not happy that he's finally being brought to justice, but neither am I sad about it because I think there is a limit to the level of sympathy I can feel for peadophile rapists...

[puxzkkx]

I think that the arguments that the case should be thrown out because the victim wants the charges dropped/has forgiven him are null. Justice should remain impartial - would we respect the victim's wishes if she espoused vengeful feeling and wanted Polanski chased down and killed?

This man has been through enough, he has already redeemed himself to some great films he has already done for humanity. Oh, he fucked some girl back in the 70s...blah blah. Our prosecutors need to focus on other shit.

Creating a great work of art doesn't 'redeem' a person of a despicable act such as this.

[Zazou dans le Metro]

Would people be so willing to defend him if he was a plumber, or a mechanic? How about if he were a bad film director..?

Is this an inducement to start a list of 'Rapist directors we are prepared to condone'?

Keep wondering about the mother's role on all this.Maybe I should see the doco.
A dwarf with a polish accent knocks on the door: Hey Mrs Geimer can you lend us your pretty 13 year old daughter for the day. I'm going to take nice little pictures
up at Jack Nicholson's pool.
Mother: Hey Sammie get your swimming things, this nice gentleman's gonna take you up to a five star cokehead's place.... No. I'm not coming.

[Skritek]

Would people be so willing to defend him if he was a plumber, or a mechanic? How about if he were a bad film director..?

While I tend to think that people who have brought a lot to all of humanity should be above the law, at least for minor things (as rich egotistical people generally also are, even if they do nothing good), this is irrelevant.

If he were a plumber, then no one would have noticed him being in the country. But this was an official invite, the man pretty much did the festival (which I never actually liked, because of many things and now, I'll never ever visit it any more) and all of Switzerland a favor. And then he gets arrested, this seems to recall some phony dictatorships more than a democratic and modern state, like Switzerland wants to be.


As for the case in itself, I also find it a little strange, if Polanski even asked the mother if he can "borrow" the girl. Something doesn't seem right and, the fault does in no way only lie with the director.

[Cinephrenic]

Creating a great work of art doesn't 'redeem' a person of a despicable act such as this.

True, but it's not like he raped a 8 year old. The bitch knew what she was up to and Polanski made some irresponsible choices as an adult. They chasing him like a international fugitive on the run for murder. Give me a break..

[jt]

... The bitch knew what she was up to ... They chasing him like a international fugitive on the run for murder. Give me a break..

Are you for real?
I'm going to step out of this argument now as its likely to turn even uglier but the idea that any blame whatsoever should be shouldered by a 13 year old girl who is raped by a 44 year old seems laughably naive. Maybe her parents were in the wrong for not protecting her but that is entirely besides the point, as is blaming the Swiss, the US or anyone but Polanski himself. He knew full well when he skipped the country that he was turning himself into an international fugitive. He's had a good 30 year run but now they've finally caught up with him. Boo hoo.

[Lemmy Caution]

What an off the charts post.


True, but it's not like he raped a 8 year old.
She was probably one of those very grown up looking 13 year olds.
Some of those 7th graders are practically begging for it.

The bitch knew what she was up to.
... getting drugged and raped.

and Polanski made some irresponsible choices as an adult.
I don't know, "irresponsible" seems like a pretty harsh term for merely drugging and raping a junior high student.

They chasing him like a international fugitive on the run for murder. Give me a break.
I mean, he's only a pedophile rapist.


Sidenote: the documentary was dull, poorly presented, and unconvincing.
Not recommended.