Roman Polanski Revisited

by zikipediq

Sunday, October 04, 2009 at 03:23 AM EDT

Why talent is not above justice.

The French filmmaker was arrested in Switzerland upon a US request due to a sex scandal back in the late 70s.

The legal issue on the case.- Roman Polanski was arrested under an international warrant of arrest issued by a US court. Many international conventions, bilateral or multilateral on judicial cooperation, get involved to require the execution of the warrant by the requested State. These agreements are not signed with any state: e.g. France has no extradition treaty with Iran or North Korea. In this occasion, we witness the execution of the extradition treaty between the United States and the Swiss Confederation, signed in Washington on November 14, 1990 (pdf here).

The warrant is notified to the authorities of the country where the person come into (if he is registered in the international database of Interpol). When a person comes to the border the police check on the base. If the answer is positive, the person must be arrested, the police have no choice. In all Western legal systems the warrant leads to provisionally incarceration, typically a few days, the time for authorities to notify the warrant to the individual, so he is able to identify who ordered his arrest and why. This is crucial for the rights of defense and the non-compliance within it leads to his immediate release. The detainee has right to counsel. He is then presented to a judge who will ask him if he agrees to be returned to the requesting state. If he refuses, the judge decides on possible release supervision – and he can appeal the warrant of arrest.

Finally, there is a fundamental principle: a State never extradites its nationals. This is contrary to the protection it owes to its citizens. That does not mean they are immune from prosecution in their home state. And I think it necessary to add that no law or international convention provides immunity for artists, Oscar-winning or not.

Mr. Polanski is French (and Polish). He is the target of an international warrant of arrest issued by a Californian court of justice for an issue dating back to 1977. At that time he had sex with a minor aged thirteen years after making her drink alcohol and consume drugs. Mr. Polanski presumption of innocence did expire as soon as the illusions of this girl broke down – since Roman Polanski admitted facts by pleading guilty. In the legal sense, Roman Polanski guiltiness is no longer on discussion. After a few days in jail, Mr. Polanski was released in hold of the sentence hearing. He took the opportunity to clear out and has carefully avoided the U.S. for thirty years. Initially, the indictment contained five charges, including rape . Following an agreement with prosecutors – as California law allows – Roman Polanski pleaded guilty to a single chief of “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor” (i.e. child sexual abuse, California Penal Code Section 261.5.), offense punishable by 4 years.

The warrant seeks to summon for sentencing, the appearance of the convicted person is required in California law. The victim has been compensated and withdrew her complaint. This was probably part of the agreement with the prosecution (the victim is not party to the criminal trial in American law). This does not preclude further prosecution. While he resided in France, Mr. Polanski was confident: France does not extradite its nationals. And he could not be prosecuted in France, although being French national, as the facts have already been tried in the United States. This is the rule non bis in idem (no matter can be judged twice).

Vanity catch out our filmmaker: he was invited to Switzerland to receive a reward for all his work, and then he came visit the pleasant federal confederation. Fatality: at the airport, when checking the passport, custom bell gave a loud ‘bang-bang’: “Mmm, this man is the subject of an international warrant of arrest issued in 2005″ thinks the policeman. “Mr.Polanski is not Swiss,so he can be stopped”… and here he tasted the wet straw of Helvetian dungeons, where he is in individual cells, confined 23 hours a day. Does it shock you? Please take note that prisoners in France are treated the same way in jail, except that in addition, they are in an overcrowded cell.

Finally, I found two shocking things in the barrage from the artists’ world.

In spite of Mr. Polanski has long suffered throughout his life – an unhappy childhood in the Cracow ghetto; then as an orphan whose parents were deported and killed by nazis; the awful murder of his wife, actress Sharon Tate, by Manson’s sect – this does not grant him a leeway or carte blanche to commit a crime and escape the law. We must not forget that this is a crime. It is a matter of rape in the person of a minor.

I find it shameful to hear artists – who a few weeks ago vowed to pillory the downloaders (Hadopi law on censorship over Internet) and approved the repressive legislation against constitutional rights to punish the illegal downloading of their works – make a fuss when it is one of them whom the law applies in its entire rigor. When you know that a lot of downloaders are in the thirteen years, we draw the impression that minors are good for their eyes only to spit their pocket money and serve as sex objects. As if their image needed it. And after that, we treat judges as corporatist.

It makes my blood boil when I hear the minister of culture pointing “the America that fears.” Oh, how we know America badly. Tocqueville had already identified 170 years ago, the passion for equality in this country. It has not changed. It is inconceivable there to treat an individual differently because he belongs to aristocracy, even THE artistic aristocracy. Even if it permanently weakened the executive, ten years ago, America has seriously considered the possibility of overthrowing the President because he lied under oath before a Grand Jury.

A justice that does not spare the powerful and those protected by the powerful? I understand now why a minister of the French Republic – who has carefully put his president and his ministers safe from justice – finds that America is frightening.

This article originally appeared on Second Nature (Zikipediq's Blog).