{"id":6634,"date":"2009-09-28T17:10:40","date_gmt":"2009-09-28T16:10:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/?p=6634"},"modified":"2009-09-29T04:42:02","modified_gmt":"2009-09-29T03:42:02","slug":"roman-polanski-arrested-in-zurich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/2009\/09\/28\/roman-polanski-arrested-in-zurich\/","title":{"rendered":"Roman Polanski arrested in Zurich"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a><\/p>\n Director Roman Polanski<\/a><\/strong> has been arrested in Zurich and faces possible extradition to the US for having sex with a 13-year-old girl in 1977.<\/p>\n The 76 year old was detained on Saturday as he travelled from France to the Zurich Film Festival<\/a>, where he was to collect a lifetime achievement award.<\/p>\n The Swiss ministry spokesman Guido Balmer told the Associated Press<\/a> that U.S. authorities have been seeking Polanski’s arrest since 2005:<\/p>\n “There was a valid arrest request and we knew when he was coming. That’s why he was taken into custody.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Polanski is currently being held under ‘provisional detention for extradition’, but won’t be transferred to U.S. authorities until all the procedural boxes have been ticked and the director can contest his detention and any possible extradition in the Swiss courts.<\/p>\n The original case dates back to the late 1970s when the director was involved in a scandal involving a 13-year old girl named Samantha Gailey, now known as Samantha Geimer.<\/p>\n According to Geimer, Polanski asked her mother if he could take photos of the young girl for French Vogue<\/a>, which the director had been asked to guest edit and her mother allowed a private photo shoot.<\/p>\n She then agreed to a second session on March 10th, 1977 which took place at the home of Polanski’s friend Jack Nicholson in the Mulholland area<\/a> of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n Later Geimer testified that at this Polanski performed various sexual acts on her, after giving her a combination of champagne<\/a> and Quaaludes<\/a>.<\/p>\n In a 2003 article for the LA Times Geimer described what happened<\/a>:<\/p>\n I met Roman Polanski in 1977, when I was 13 years old. I was in ninth grade that year, when he told my mother that he wanted to shoot pictures of me for a French magazine.<\/p>\n That’s what he said, but instead, after shooting pictures of me at Jack Nicholson’s house on Mulholland Drive, he did something quite different. He gave me champagne and a piece of a Quaalude. And then he took advantage of me.<\/p>\n It was not consensual sex by any means. I said no, repeatedly, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. I was alone and I didn’t know what to do. It was scary and, looking back, very creepy.<\/p>\n Those may sound like kindergarten words, but that’s the way it feels to me. It was a very long time ago, and it is hard to remember exactly the way everything happened. But I’ve had to repeat the story so many times, I know it by heart.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The original charges against Polanski when he was arrested in March 1977 were: giving Quaaludes to a minor; child molestation; unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor; rape by use of drugs; oral copulation and sodomy.<\/p>\n Polanski never denied the charges, but in the legal negotiations that followed they were dismissed under the terms of a plea bargain by which he pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a minor.<\/p>\n After 42 days’ in prison over the winter of 1977-78, Polanski was passed as fit to stand trial and reportedly expected that he would be freed under a deal with the presiding judge, Laurence J. Rittenband<\/a>.<\/p>\n Geimer also recounted in her 2003 piece that this deal – agreed between the defence, prosecution and judge – was reneged upon at the last minute:<\/p>\n We pressed charges, and he pleaded guilty. A plea bargain was agreed to by his lawyer, my lawyer and the district attorney, and it was approved by the judge. But to our amazement, at the last minute the judge went back on his word and refused to honor the deal.<\/p>\n Worried that he was going to have to spend 50 years in prison — rather than just time already served — Mr. Polanski fled the country. He’s never been back, and I haven’t seen him or spoken to him since.<\/p>\n Looking back, there can be no question that he did something awful. It was a terrible thing to do to a young girl. But it was also 25 years ago — 26 years next month. And, honestly, the publicity surrounding it was so traumatic that what he did to me seemed to pale in comparison.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n It was when Polanski got wind that Rittenband was ready to break the agreement \u2013 allegedly due to fears of a public backlash – he flew to London in February 1978 and a day later fled to France.<\/p>\n To this day he has never returned to the US for fear of arrest or travelled to certain countries with extradition treaties.<\/p>\n He subsequently moved to France, where he has lived ever since and currently holds citizenship, protected by their limited extradition policies with US.<\/p>\n Since then he has made all his films in Europe, which have included Tess<\/a> (1978), Pirates<\/a> (1986), Frantic<\/a> (1988), Bitter Moon<\/a> (1992), Death and the Maiden<\/a> (1994) and The Pianist<\/a> (2002).<\/p>\n When he won Best Director for The Pianist at the Oscars in March 2003, Harrison Ford collected the award on his behalf and there was even a standing ovation.<\/p>\n