Of Ben-Hur, you mean?
Granted that it's too easy and a cliché
to connect your work with your life in such a direct manner.
Let me take the example of Chinatown.
Chinatown is really a movie about justice not winning.
Is that what you had come to believe?
No, not at all.
But if you want your film to serve any purpose,
if you want to show injustice or corruption of Los Angeles
in that period,
you have to show that injustice somehow won
and leave them with a feeling of frustration.
I hope you don't mind if I just reach across here
and grab a couple of these... - of these nuts.
I will too.
Anyway, that's... - that's fiction.
And I think this probably may be still in the land of fiction,
edging towards fact.
When the... - when the newspapers
and the magazines and the books
talk about you and little girls,
is there anything in it?
Well, I-I like young women... - let's put it this way... -
and I think most of men do, actually.
Yeah, but the question... -
the question turns on how young, doesn't it?
Well, yes, well, here you come to a concrete case
for which I have been
behind bars.
And that's what you want to talk about.
But what exactly would you like me to tell you?
The Los Angeles police department today
announced the arrest of Raymond Polanski
as a result of a complaint filed
by the mother of a 13-year-old female.
It was a year of anxiety, a year of drama for me,
and I thought it was simply enough.
Enough is enough, and that was my decision to leave.
You ran away, Roman.
You ran away.
Well, I, as you say, ran away
because I think that I was very unfortunate
to have a judge who misused justice.
And he was playing with me for a period of a year.
I think that I was some kind of mouse
with which some abominable cat begins a sport.
People were not in the habit
of calling me at 2:00 in the morning.
So I was sleeping.
I picked up the phone,
and they said, "Roman's been arrested. "
And I said, "What for?"
And they said, "Rape. "
I said, "I-I... -
I just could not... - it just made no sense.
I mean, this is somebody who could not be a rapist, you know?
I mean, it's somebody I know really, really well.
I was working West L.A. Homicide,
and I also handled sex crimes.
And I came into work and had a crime report on my desk
of a-a rape that had been reported,
and Roman Polanski was the named suspect in it.
After I received the report, I started the follow-up.
I went to interview the victim and her mother,
did an extensive interview with them,
made sure that... - that any physical evidence
would have been recovered from her, that she had,
and then I-I went and talked to the district attorney's office.
Vannatter came into the office, and we sat down,
and he ran the case by me.
He showed me the incident report,
a crime report taken by a couple of patrol officers,
which is a narrative of the facts and stuff.
Time was kind of of the essence, so we got the search warrant,
and it was for two locations.
It was for Jack Nicholson's house, where the crime occurred,
and also for Polanski's suite
on the second floor of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.
Me and my partner along with a narcotics officer
proceeded with the search warrant to the hotel.
We were walking in,
and he was walking out with a group of people,
obviously going out for the evening.
And I told Phil.
I said, "There he is. "
And we stopped, 'cause he would have walked right on by us.
So we said, "Mr. Polanski, LAPD. We have to talk. "
And he came out, and he says,
"Is this gonna be more than a few minutes?
If it is, I'll let my people go. "
He says, "Yes, it's going to be more than a few minutes. "
We proceeded up to his room
and completed the search warrant,
which we did find the camera equipment,
the film that we ultimately had developed, and... -
and it did show nude pictures of the victim.
Totally nude?
Well, she was in a... - she was in a spa.
You could see the upper portion of her body.
You couldn't see her whole body, because she was in the water,
but they were nude pictures.
Polanski was nervous.
He was upset.
And he's one of those people that just talk.
And I suspect he figures, "Well, if I talk and talk,
I can probably talk my way out of this thing. "
He was, like, on a hyper high,
and he's constantly talking, constantly fidgeting.
And he... - he didn't perceive
having intercourse with a 13-year-old girl
as against the law.
That... - that was not in his culture, that... -
you know, "So what?" type thing.
He didn't... - he didn't realize, I guess,
the laws of our country as compared to other countries.
I'm not so sure that Mr. Polanski was aware
of what being arrested in America meant.
I know it's a very nice piece of news for all of you.
It's a lot of sensational stuff.
But try to go beyond and understand my position.
It's not the best type of publicity,
not something I desire.
I have not much to tell you except that I am innocent.
Thank you.
When the case arrived here,
there was an absolute mob of publicity,
the Associated Press, UPI, New York Times,
Los Angeles Times, celebrity mags,
German reporters, French reporters,
British reporters.
I had never seen a media feeding frenzy before,
and this courtroom embodied it.
You couldn't meet anybody,
whether he was known or not known at all,
who didn't have an opinion about this case.
And it was one of the biggest cases.
I didn't work for weeks and months
on anything else but this case.
As the case progressed, I was struck... -
you know, how could this same man be two different things
to two different sets of press?
The European reporters looked on Polanski
as this tragic, brilliant, historic figure.
Here was this man who had survived the Holocaust,
who had survived the gassing of his mother
and then had come here and developed his own voice,
had maintained his integrity
against the power of the Hollywood machine.
And the American press tended to look at him
as this sort of malignant, twisted dwarf
with this dark vision.
Roman was the perfect villain for them.
He was a foreigner.
He had a thick accent.
He made lots of money in the movie business.
He was short. He was perfect.
In California at that time, had he not been who he was,
in other words, a famous controversial director
with the legacy of his wife's murder behind him,
the whole thing would have been completely different.
Roman Polanski is 32.
He has just completed his fourth feature film,
The Vampire Killers,
set in the snow-covered mountains of Transylvania.
He both directs and plays one of the leading parts.
Hold it, boys.
Sharon.
Looking at him, not at me, okay?
Yeah.
You know where.
Roman Polanski was born in France of Polish parents.
They left there when he was three
and went to live in Poland.
I don't know. I think I'm a nomad, you know.
But I... - I'm really strongly attached to Polish background.
I've grown up in Poland.
My mother was killed by Germans very soon,
and my father was taken to the concentration camp
after two years of war, and then I was by myself.
One of the first film... -
films I've seen was Snow White, you know?
And I think it influenced me enormously forever.
And... - and I, as you see,
it's enormous influence of this in my work, like Repulsion
or, you know, Cul-de-sac.
I always wanted to be a director.
I knew I wanted to make movies.
I knew I wanted to be a part of it.
I knew I wanted to create this.
An American producer of Polish origin
suggested that I come to London and make a film there.
London was fabulous.
You cannot imagine what it meant
for someone who lived in the gray, drab communist reality.
It was a very civilized way of living:
The rooms always full of friendly faces.
You saw your friends every day, and there were lots of them.
Life without limits.
I got a phone call from a friend of ours,
a mutual friend who was a film producer,
and he said, "I've got this friend who's coming to London,
"and he doesn't speak any English.
Can you take care of him?"
I said, "Sure, send him round. "
Roman was totally exceptional.
I was really drawn to him, and so was everybody else.
Already an established film director,
no one in London had heard of him.
Few people had seen his films.
Yes, yes, yes.
Go, go again.
That was funny.
From coming as a complete unknown,
I would say, within six months, everybody knew him.
He was a charismatic fellow.
There are very few directors who have Roman's personality
and also his appetite for life,
his appetite for life.
Give us a smile.
They met in London because of a film that he made
called The Dance of the Vampires.
She was a remarkable person...
beautiful, gentle,
unsophisticated in the best sense of the word,
really a genuine human being.
They were great together, and of course,
it created this fantastic love affair.
And it truly was a love affair.
Look, it all started so long ago.
My real problems started then, with the murder of Sharon Tate.
I was all right with the press before that.
They... - they wouldn't let it go.
It's just the story that will never go.
Pardon me?
Why'd you want a gag order?
We didn't ask for a gag order.
Who did, Mr. Dalton?
No one asked for a gag order.
Then why did the judge bring it up at this stage?
Well, maybe the judge can answer that.
The topic of publicity was discussed,
and certain measures were discussed
to try to control the publicity,
but no one asked for a gag order as such.
There was an hour-long discussion in chambers.
Did that deal principally with publicity problems?
Yes, a great part of it did.
What do you see as the problems with publicity right now?
Well, the problem with publicity is, there's been too much of it.
And, of course, for me to go on television
and complain about publicity is a little inconsistent.
Excuse me.
I've never spoken publicly about this case before.
But if the story is to be told, I want it to be told factually.
I know the facts.
I was there.
Can you give us your reaction
to the delay of the start of the trial?
My reaction to it?
Well, I-I'm pleased.
In what way?
Well, there's a good deal of work-up
that goes into any major case.
People have the right to their own opinions
about what happened,
but they don't have the right to their own facts.
The fact of Polanski leaving the country and so forth
seems to have eclipsed
the really important part of this case
about what actually happened to the system of justice.
I remain astounded after all these years.
This case will never leave me.
Defense attorney Doug Dalton
had a very Lincoln-esque quality about him.
Dignified, not given to flamboyant gestures.
He doesn't raise his voice in the courtroom.
He maintains this calm demeanor.
And he was the master of negotiations.
The fact that Doug Dalton was the attorney
indicated to me that there would be
a negotiated plea arrived at between the prosecution,
the defense, and the judge.
Douglas Dalton was a first-class lawyer,
but he was definitely matched by Roger Gunson.
The district attorney's office put Gunson on the case,
a 37-year-old, very straight-thinking Mormon.
We are concerned with the... -
protecting the privacy of the girl,
the complaining witness in this case.
And it's my understanding
that there have been foreign reporters and investigators
who have attempted to contact her and have interviews... -
Gunson was the model of rectitude.
He had that same kind of handsome schoolboy,
sparkling good looks as Robert Redford.
The rumor in the district attorney's office
was that they picked Gunson to handle the case
because he was a Mormon
and because he was the only member of the DA's office
who hadn't had sex with an underage girl.
I heard some jokes about why they gave it to me,
but I can't imagine those are accurate.
There were a lot of prosecutors
who had an interest in high-publicity cases.
Although I had had one very high publicity case,
I was not one that looked for them.
They were the perfect attorneys to handle a case like this,
where the evidence and the players were sensational,
were dramatic, flamboyant.
So you want two attorneys who kept an even keel.
They were, in that regard, very strikingly different
from the judge in the case.
When the grand jury came back with the indictment,
Judge Rittenband, who was very interested
in handling celebrity cases
obviously saw it and realized that he wanted it,
went to the presiding judge and said,
"Hey, I want this case. "
He was, of course, the senior judge in Santa Monica,
which was the choice location for any judge,
because that's where you get
a lot of these high-publicity cases.
Judge Rittenband had handled a Cary Grant paternity suit.
He had handled, well, the Priscilla and Elvis divorce,
the Marlon Brando custody suit that went on forever.
There were quite a few.
I spoke to Judge Rittenband very frequently,
and he liked being among the stars,
but I don't think he was starstruck.
And come to order. Court is now in session.
Rittenband loved the press,
always had comments for the press.
He wanted to shape the way the press covered him.
Sitting up there on the bench, he acted like a director,
a tyrannical director calling the shots,
telling people when to make their entrances,
what to say, where to position themselves.
Well, it was an... - it... - I missed... -
we misspoke ourselves, You Honor.
There's obviously other basis for the motion.
Yes, we don't need that anymore.
There were a lot of similarities
between Judge Rittenband and Roman Polanski.
Not too tall in stature.
He liked the ladies, and he loved to dance.
He had his friends in the movie industry,
which he'd see every day at the Hillcrest Country Club.
When I first met him, I was answering phones,
and he used to say,
"I'm going to Hillcrest. I'm going to Hillcrest. "
And finally, I stop and I says, "What's going on at Hillcrest?"
You know, "Do you... - is your wife there?"
You know, 'cause I didn't know if he was married or not.
And he said, "Oh, I'm not married. "
And I said, "Oh, okay. "
I was 20 years old.
He was 34 years older.
He was 54 when I met him, and we became friends.
Oh, golly, practically every evening, he'd come here,
and he'd sit over in that chair.
And he loved champagne.
So I'd get champagne by the case.
"Judge Rittenband," I said,
"What would you at your age do with a girlfriend?"
He said, "I'd do the same thing that you did
and probably better. "
And I said, "Well, tell me about it. "
He said, "Well, I got one that cooks,
and one that does the other things. "
Rittenband was known as a hammer.
That means that he was a tough judge
and a tough sentencer.
If you didn't make a deal,
and you didn't have the deal in place when you went in there,
you were in trouble.
I don't remember any judge that liked publicity like Rittenband did.
He'd have his bailiff maintain a scrapbook
that went back many years,
and if an article appeared anywhere
about something involving Laurence J. Rittenband,
it wound up in the scrapbook.
It was kept somewhere in the court,
I think, in the bailiff's desk,
and on occasion would come out and be displayed.
Judge Rittenband was receiving requests
from people all over the world, from news agencies
wanting one of the seats in his courtroom.
He was soliciting reservations for each one of these chairs.
So it was going to be a real circus.
All right, if you gentlemen would just stand still,
Mr. Polanski will stay here, and you can get your shot.
Because another trial in the same courtroom
is taking much longer than expected,
the rape trial of Roman Polanski
has been delayed until August 9th,
exactly eight years to the day his late wife,
actress Sharon Tate, was brutally murdered.
At that time,
rape victims' names didn't get reported in the press,
much less the names of minors who were involved in sex cases.
But with the European press there,
her name would come out exposed in the press,
her background exposed,
the fact that she had had a prior relationship.
She had taken quaaludes before.
All of this had gotten out
and would have forever haunted her.
Once we knew her name,
we knew where her school was,
we knew where her house was,
the French competition were after this girl.
They were hunting this girl.
It was awful.
Everybody knew at school.
People came to school with cameras
and things were being said and printed.
The worst part was, no one believed me.
Everybody thought I was making it up.
It was so traumatic, starting that night, when my mom called the police.
Then the police come over, and they take you to the hospital.
Then take you to the police station.
The next morning, we're getting up at 6:30.
We're going to court,
where they're gonna sneak you in,
and all these men are gonna ask you exactly what happened.
And they're gonna sit a lady behind you you can't even see,
because then there's a lady there.
All that stuff was so traumatic
that I never even had a chance to really, you know,
worry about, you know, what happened that night with him.
It was like, it just... -
I had to worry about surviving the next day.
The facts indicate that before the... -
the alleged act in this case,
this girl had engaged in sexual activity.
That's contained in reports that we now have.
We want to know about it.
We want to know who was involved, when.
We want to know why these other people were not prosecuted,
and this is a thing we want to fully develop.
I would have as soon just walked away from it the next day,
but you can't stop it once it starts.
I mean, I just... -
I just... - I went in my room, pretty much,
and just turned it off.
In Chinatown, he exposed the dark side of corruption.
In Repulsion, he explored a warped mind.
In Rosemary's Baby, he examined the occult.
Now something altogether new, altogether chilling.
No one does it to you like Roman Polanski.
I wanted to find more out about Mr. Polanski,
and luck have it, the Nuart Theater
right down the street on Santa Monica Boulevard
had a Polanski film festival
right after the indictment and before trial.
Murder and treason!
What have you done to its eyes?
Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown.
Every Roman Polanski movie has a theme,
corruption meeting innocence over water.
I says, "Oh, well, that's sort of what we have here,
"corruption, Roman Polanski,
"meeting innocence, a 13-year-old girl,
over water, meaning the Jacuzzi. "
I felt I was gonna be able
to pretty well convey to some jurors that this happened
and he had directed a scene very similar to this
in his real life.
You'd better have your legs tied down
in case of convulsions.
Rosemary's Baby was such a great movie
and was so well made
that people took it for the real thing.
This is no dream.
This is really happening.
After that, Roman had this reputation
maybe having been a little bit in league
with the devil himself.
It didn't hurt him.
People were very intrigued,
and it was kind of sexy in a way.
He had a tremendous power over people.
You had to fall in love with him, you know?
He was completely infectious.
There was no resisting him,
and every day was so vibrant,
because he felt so passionately about what he was doing,
and he was on an adventure.
One of the things that you are renowned for
is your recklessness.
You say that you're a reckless person.
Do I say that?
You say that very frequently
to all sorts of people you talk to,
but clearly you're going to deny
every single syllable of it tonight.
Really?
I mean, are you a reckless person?
Are you afraid of anything?
I am reckless, but I don't tell people about it.
Roman found California fantastic.
Of Los Angeles, he says...
Everything is easy here.
You want to learn karate, you can learn karate.
You want to play chess, you can play chess.
You want to drive racing cars, you can drive racing cars.
You can... - everything is accessible in this town.
Rosemary's Baby was a huge hit.
Roman was on top of the world.
Nothing could have been better.
He was in love with Sharon.
They were having great parties.
He was going all over the world.
He was the toast of the industry.
He was hanging out with all of the people
that everybody wanted to hang out with.
Everybody wanted a piece of Roman
because the work was so original.
Roman, Sharon.
Hi.
This is the very beautiful Sharon Tate,
who I'm sure you've seen in films,
and her husband, very talented Roman Polanski,
best known for his original film,
Knife in the Water, which he wrote and directed.
And he's also responsible for Rosemary's Baby,
the picture.
And I think maybe a little later,
we'll get a chance to sit down
and talk a little bit about sex and films.
Any time.
It certainly was a happy time for all of us.
Roman was happy.
He was with beautiful Sharon.
Everyone loved her.
He loved her. I loved her.
We all loved her.
He was so insecure about so many things.
Knowing about his childhood,
he didn't have the blueprint for life that others had.
One hoped for Roman, you know,
that this brand-new life with a woman who loved him
and who seemed so right for him, with a baby,
that there would be this security
that he had not had in his life and in a new homeland.
I mean, the future was his, we thought.
And then everything just collapsed.
Well, we were preparing a film
that I was going to produce called The Day of the Dolphin.
We were writing the script in London.
Roman was a perfectionist.
He was always just,
"We'll finish it in a couple of days
and then do the rest in L.A."
It was a Saturday, and the phone rang,
and I picked it up,
and it was our agent Bill Tennant
who was on the phone,
and I immediately realized that something was terribly wrong.
I mean, he... - he was a very stable kind of guy.
He was absolutely distraught.
And I-I said, "What is it?"
And he said, you know, something like,
"They're all dead. They're all dead. "
And I realized something awful had happened,
and I gave the phone to Roman, and...
I've never seen anything like it.
You know, I saw somebody just disintegrate
in front of my eyes.
This was at the home of movie director Roman Polanski.
It was his wife, Sharon Tate, who was one of the victims.
She, too, had repeated stab wounds.
One of the victims had a hood placed over his head,
and the word "pig" was written in blood on the door.
We flew to L.A. The next day.
He was devastated, devastated to a point
that I've never seen any other human being
in that kind of condition.
And I remember picking up Sunday newspapers.
I was already reasonably aware of how the press functions,
and their business is selling newspapers.
The story was basically how Roman had flown to Los Angeles,
murdered them all, and then come back.
I mean, this was actually in the newspapers, in the headlines.
The nature of the murders,
you know, Satanism, Rosemary's Baby.
This is the guy who made Rosemary's Baby.
He knew so much about it.
He couldn't have known so much about it
without actually being involved in it,
and so he must have been part of the cult,
and there was a cult, and they were murdered,
and who gets murdered in this kind of way?
And it was a typical example
of the victims being responsible for their own deaths.
It was shocking.
It was truly unbelievable.
The last day I talked to her
was a few hours before the tragedy happened.
You are suddenly curious about my relationship with Sharon
within last few months.
I can tell you the last few months,
as much as last few years I spent with her...
Were only time of true happiness in my life.
And facts which will be coming out day after day
will make a shame... -
a lot of newsmen, who for selfish reason,
write... - unbearable for me... - horrible things about my wife.
After Sharon was murdered,
really, everybody was totally freaked out.
It was a very weird time,
the highest paranoia.
The transition of this sort of hippy kind of existence in L.A.
To this brutal awakening of an understanding
that these kind of absolutely horrible events can happen.
No one locked their doors.
No one thought about that there was any kind of threat.
That ended at the end of the '60s
and simultaneously changed everything overnight in L.A.
It was the end of a fairy tale, really,
in Roman's life, in everybody's life.
He would have been a father of a son
who would have now been, what, 30 years old?
Maybe he would have had other children
probably would have continued living in California.
Who knows?
How does one survive?
When you know his childhood,
he's a very, very strong human being.
I think that the idea of the magnet of tragedy
started after the Tate murders.
He was living out in Malibu,
and the neighbors were all, like, horrified,
because somehow, if he was in the house next door,
there was gonna be another mass murder.
I mean, people are just too weird, I tell you.
It's crazy.
Hold it, there, kitty cat.
Hold it.
Hello, Claude.
Where'd you get the midget?
You're a very nosy fella, kitty cat, huh?
You know what happens to nosy fellows?
Huh? No?
Want to guess?
Huh? No?
Okay, they lose their noses.
Next time you lose the whole thing.
Cut it off and feed it to my goldfish.
Roman was different when I met him on Chinatown.
He's still a guy that loved life.
There was just this real dark shadow
that he had to deal with every day,
that, you know, there were people who were constantly,
"So what was it like, you know, when you... -
"when Sharon... - when your... -
you know, when your wife was killed?"
Do you hate certain members of the press
for the way the... -
you were treated after your wife's murder?
Well, yes.
To be honest, I do.
But I wouldn't call it a hatred now.
You see, it's somehow evolved to just indifference.
And I simply don't read it and try to avoid.
Yeah.
But, in general, I despise the press tremendously
for its inaccuracy, for its irresponsibility,
and for its often even deliberate cruelty.
And all this, it's for lucrative purposes.
If one of your complaints
is the way the press misrepresents you,
and it is one of your complaints,
then surely it'd be a good tactic
to give them the minimum possible target.
Yes, but then you have to... -
you have to change your lifestyle completely
and go into hiding.
It seems like, say, six months after the murders,
you're in the Alps
and consorting with these girls
from the finishing school and so on.
I mean, it's... -
I could see how you would sort of try to... -
to lose yourself like that,
but is... - is it wise to say so?
Yes, it is wise to say so.
Why not?
Why wouldn't it be wise to say so?
That's the way it was.
And that's the way it is, you know?
I mean, just... -
different people have different way
of seeing life and relationships.
It's not necessarily the same with you than me.
And people, they react in different ways to grief.
Some go to a monastery.
Others start visiting whorehouses.
He decided he was gonna survive.
And the way he was gonna survive
is through his talent and having fun.
Whether it was dinner for four
and he was holding court with some idea he had
or whether it was a group of 30 or 40 or 50,
he liked to be the center of it all.
He was a wonderful host, almost like a dance master.
He kept it all sort of stirred.
It gave him enormous pleasure.
And after Sharon,
I think he didn't want to be alone too much.
It's not so good to be alone.
Everybody knows, the best way to get close to your dream
is to get to know a star, a real star.
Polanski, after Chinatown, was not only a real star;
he was the Roman Polanski, a big name.
She wouldn't mind being discovered
by a man like Roman Polanski.
After all, she had seen in the French Vogue
pictures of Nastassia Kinski,
who was 15 when she started her affair with Roman Polanski,
or Roman started it with her.
And everybody had the opinion,
if Polanski wouldn't have done
this photo layout with Nastassia,
she would have never become such a well-known young star.
He was a friend of a guy my sister was dating,
and he wanted girls to model.
I was modeling and acting and wanted to... -
you know, wanted to be in the business.
So that was a great opportunity, you know.
We signed right up.
"Sure, have my pictures taken by Roman Polanski.
Sounds great. "
Susie Gailey, the mother of the alleged victim,
introduced herself as an actress to Polanski.
And she had done some work in films.
Well, I was innocent, see?
And that's the truth.
What else can I say?
I remember vaguely meeting the mother at some party,
you know, like, "Hi. "
And then I was away and then heard about all of this.
But just in what I was told and what I read,
I kept going back to the same question:
Why did the mother bring her 13-year-old daughter
into this group?
Especially if she had spent time with them
and all the things that she said subsequently were true,
wouldn't you keep your 13-year-old daughter
away from that?
You know, this was a guy that had a pretty wild reputation.
He was known as a womanizer.
He's a partygoer.
He certainly had a lot of women over the years,
and he loved young women.
Why would her mother allow her to be alone with Polanski?
I don't like... - you know, you always get the,
"Where was your mom?"
And it's like, you know, give my mom a break.
You know, it's not her fault.
And so I... -
you know, I don't like hearing anybody's opinion on it.
Every time someone brings it up
and they're doing their little, you know, banter on TV,
it's like, "You weren't there.
"You don't know.
"What are you talking about?
"You're saying how I felt,
"what happened, how you feel about Polanski.
"You have no idea,
"and you're on the news making all these statements,
"and thousands of people are listening to you,
and just shut up. "
Another hearing on the admissibility
of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel records
has been set for next Friday.
From Santa Monica, Furnell Chatman,
News Center 4.
I was instrumental in arranging the plea bargain,
because as I looked at this family and Samantha,
I thought, at the time, some people knew her name,
and some of the kids at school knew who she was.
I thought it was important to try to maintain her anonymity,
anonymity which would have disappeared
had the case gone to trial.
And so I tried to persuade the district attorney,
who had a new plea bargaining policy,
a tough plea bargaining policy.
I said, "I'm not gonna do it.
I have no interest in doing it. "
And so what he decided was... - he says,
"Well, I'm gonna do it myself. "
The LAPD brought the evidence envelope
to this courthouse building
and brought it in, actually, to this room.
There were about five, six, or seven men standing around,
looking, peering down at this evidence envelope,
and someone takes it and turns and opens it,
and out falls these little girl's panties.
And so there was this enormous court battle
over property that belonged to her
as to what was to be done with them.
And Judge Rittenband decided to cut it in half
and give half to the prosecution and half to the defense.
The defense expert went over and put on his latex gloves
and came back
and then started operating on these copper panties.
If you can imagine the humor
of about seven men sitting around a table.
Trying to identify any stains and to make sure that the cut
or the piece includes part of that stain.
And they were fighting and,
"No, no, it has to be just a little to this way.
"No, it should be over here.
We shouldn't cut that way at all. "
So finally they... - they made the cut.
What we understood was that Dalton was going to take his half
and submit it to a lab.
I also understood that the lab was about to give its report
in two weeks.
And two weeks and three days later,
Dalton called me on the phone,
clearly now, I think, having the results on the lab report,
saying, "You know, what do you think would happen
if we pursued a plea bargain with the prosecution?"
At which point... - at that point,
I realized that now Polanski had an interest,
that the stain in the panties
was gonna be brutal evidence for them.
The prosecution had loaded Polanski up
with multiple charges.
The only one he was willing to admit and to plead guilty to
was that he had had consensual sex with the minor.
Mr. Dalton asked, "Could it be a misdemeanor?"
And I says, "No. "
"That he not go to state prison?"
And I says, "No, that's got to be open. "
And so he agreed to all those,
and we agreed that it'd be unlawful sexual intercourse,
the lowest count that related to the gravamen.
The agreement was
that Polanski would plead guilty to the one count,
that he would be sentenced based upon a probation report
and the argument of counsel.
At that time, the sentence for unlawful sexual intercourse
was what they characterized as an indeterminate sentence.
So you're sent to state prison
from anywhere from six months to 50 years.
I checked, and there hadn't been anyone sent to prison
for a conviction of this offense
in the year preceding Roman Polanski's case.
I thought it was a very good disposition
for the reason that it vindicated the family
and the girl,
and it exposed Mr. Polanski to significant time in custody
based upon a probation report.
By entering his guilty plea,
Polanski avoided going to trial,
a trial that was to have begun tomorrow,
the eighth anniversary of his wife's death
at the hands of the Charles Manson family.
Standing with his lawyer Douglas Dalton,
Polanski was asked by Deputy District Attorney Roger Gunson
to what count he pleaded guilty.
Polanski: "I had intercourse with a female person,
not my wife, who was under 18 years of age. "
Gunson: "How old did you think the girl was?"
Polanski: "I understood she was 13."
The plea bargaining was the result of a request
by attorney Lawrence Silver, representing the girl's family.
Silver asked Judge Laurence Rittenband to accept the plea
and protect the girl from the glare of publicity.
Silver: "A stigma would attach to her for a lifetime,
and justice is not made of such stuff. "
Judge Rittenband, in accepting the guilty plea,
ordered Polanski to be examined by two psychiatrists.
Sentencing will come after that,
when the judge could declare the director
a mentally disordered sex offender.
That could result in commitment to a state mental hospital.
Other possible sentences include one year in county jail,
up to 50 years in a state prison,
deportation, or probation.
We took our chances, obviously, here,
because we had no idea or no way of knowing
what the probation department would conclude.
Judge Rittenband appointed me to evaluate Mr. Polanski
for purposes of determining whether he was at that time
a mentally disordered sex offender,
which was a legal term having to do with an individual who,
by reason of a mental disorder,
was predisposed to the commission of sexual offenses
that rendered him a danger to the health and safety of others.
He was a very congenial but somewhat reserved guy
who was very straightforward in the interview.
As experiences go,
Roman Polanski has had more
than what would impact on a dozen people
in terms of his life as a child, confusion.
And ultimately, he gets what he feels is a stable relationship,
and that's taken away from him at the snap of a finger.
He had difficulty
in developing relationships with women after that.
I think he felt very, very hesitant,
maybe out of fear.
My opinion paralleled the recommendation
of the probation department.
I didn't talk about whether he should go... -
should or should not go to jail.
I really focused solely on the psychiatric issues,
and it was my opinion that Mr. Polanski did not qualify
as a mentally disordered sex offender
and should not be handled as such.
My feeling was, the guy belonged in state prison.
Rittenband had asked me about it.
I said, "Judge," I said,
"You know, you're gonna give this guy probation. "
He said, "No, I want to send him to jail. "
I said, "You'll never do it,
"because the first thing that's gonna happen
when you sentence him: He's gonna appeal it. "
"I'm gonna give him a year in a county jail. "
That would be the sentence that appealed immediately.
"I'm gonna give him weekends in the county jail. "
Immediate appeal.
No matter what the sentence was,
if it included a day in jail, Dalton, and correctly so,
would have appealed it.
And it's gonna go all the way up to the state supreme court.
He has the money.
And he'll take it to the U. S. Supreme Court
if he thinks he can.
He says, "Well, what am I gonna do?"
The judge called me in to chambers.
He looked at me and said, "Dick, tell me.
What the hell do I do with Polanski?"
And I went, "Whoa, Your Honor, that's your decision.
"That's not mine.
"I'm a reporter.
I can't advise you on something like that. "
I hadn't been covering courts that long,
but I knew a decision by a judge
was supposed to be a decision by a judge
and was not to take in any advice from any other person
other than what was there in the law books,
what had been entered into evidence in the case.
He says, "Well, what am I gonna do
or what should I do?"
And I said, "You know, what you should do
is send him up for a 90-day observation. "
A 12.03.03 is a diagnostic study
where a defendant on a felony case
is sent to Chino for a 90-day observation.
It's like a in-depth probation report.
And he says, "Well, what will that do?"
And I said, "It's not a final sentence.
"He can't appeal it.
He has to go. "
We were very pleased when we got the probation report.
It recommended that Polanski serve no time in custody
and receive a straight probationary sentence.
However, we received a call from Judge Rittenband
asking us to come to chambers,
that he wanted to discuss the matter with us.
The probation officer, Roger Gunson, and I
all went into his chambers for a meeting.
At that time, the judge said he was not going to follow
the recommendation of the probation department.
He had decided that as punishment for Polanski,
he was going to send him to the state prison at Chino
for a diagnostic study.
Gunson and the probation officer both protested.
I told him that the law was that the diagnostic study
was not to be used as punishment or as someone's sentence.
The courts are not supposed to use that.
And his response was,
"I don't want to send Mr. Polanski to county jail,
"because I don't want to be responsible
if he were to be injured or killed. "
I said, "Judge, we had not expected this.
"Polanski's engaged right now in directing a large movie
"that involves many people, millions of dollars.
This is gonna cause a tremendous hardship. "
And he suggested that I request a stay,
a stay meaning to defer, put off this diagnostic study,
in order for Polanski
to be able to complete his work on the film.
What he wanted to do was have us go out into open court
and pretend as though... -
I don't know if he'd use the word pretend... -
but not to divulge that we knew what was going to happen.
He said, "I want you to go out, Gunson,
"and you argue that Polanski should be placed in custody,
"and, Dalton, you go out,
"and you argue that he should be put on probation.
"Then I will make my remarks,
"and I will sentence him to Chino for the diagnostic study,
"and the press need not know anything more about this.
"If you do not tell the press about this,
"and if Polanski receives a good report
"from the probation department,
"which we all are quite sure he will,
that will conclude his punishment. "
I wasn't going to argue about it.
Polanski's fate hung in the balance.
If I started protesting about the diagnostic study,
Rittenband could well have said,
"Well, I'll just send him to prison.
How would you like that?"
That was the fabrication that he... -
the scenario that he wanted to present
and he did present.
This thing had reached the point
where it was actually becoming surreal.
Gunson and I walked into the courtroom,
which was packed with newsmen and spectators.
We took our places at the counsel table, sat down,
and waited for the entrance of Judge Rittenband.
I argued first.
It was a very strange feeling to be arguing
when I knew exactly what the result was going to be.
It was like having a mock trial.
In law school, we did this.
We had staged trials and so forth,
but even then, we didn't know what the result was going to be.
But we dutifully went out.
I argued for probation.
I tried to make it sound as authentic as I could.
Gunson got up and made his argument,
and then Rittenband proceeded to give his closing remarks,
which had been obviously prepared in advance.
He argued much better than either one of us,
and as I sat there and listened, I thought,
"I think I see what's happening here.
"He knows that this is a probation case.
"The probation department has recommended probation.
"Chino will very likely recommend the same thing.
"And he wants to condition the press and the public
"to the fact that when he puts Polanski on probation,
"that they see the basis that he used
in arriving at that conclusion. "
After 20 minutes in court
before Superior Judge Laurence Rittenband,
film director Roman Polanski and his lawyer Douglas Dalton
emerged from the courtroom
amidst a crush of reporters and cameramen.
Dalton had asked the court to place Polanski on probation,
arguing that, though the crime of unlawful intercourse
is a serious one, it is not a unique crime.
The prosecutor, Deputy District Attorney Roger Gunson,
asked that Polanski be placed in custody,
though it was noted that the 13-year-old girl in the case
and her family had asked the court
not to incarcerate the film director.
On the basis of two psychiatric evaluations,
the judge ruled that Polanski
was not a mentally disordered sex offender,
but he did order Polanski to undergo 90 days
further psychiatric testing at Chino state prison,
postponing a final sentence until the testing is completed.
Judge Rittenband granted Polanski a three-month stay
to conclude his present work.
At the end of that time,
the film director will go to Chino state prison
for 90 days diagnostic testing.
Robin Groth, NBC news, Santa Monica.
Sentencing put off Until he finishes film
Why are you leaving the country, sir?
Sorry?
Why are you leaving the country?
Where?
You're gonna leave the country on a business trip,
is that correct?
Can you tell us about that trip?
I'm going to Paris.
Will you come back?
Will I come back?
I certainly will.
What do you think about... -
Don't worry.
Dino just called up and said, "Wonderful news.
"My god, Lorenzo, we got Roman.
We got Roman. "
It was a potboiler:
Pearl divers getting caught in a giant clam and all that stuff.
And Roman had reasonable contempt for the script;
not a picture that Roman would have done.
And I imagine that... - again, I didn't discuss it,
but basically, nobody else, I presume,
would hire him at that time.
And De Laurentiis,
seeing a chance to get a great director
who otherwise he couldn't possibly have approached
for this project, stepped in immediately.
It was a coup, a triumph,
you know, taking advantage of this guy's troubles to some extent.
Better luck for Roman would have been a judge
that never allowed him to go to Europe at all.
Roman called me; he said,
"Listen, I mean, I'm here in Munich. Can we meet?"
I said, "Of course. "
And we decided to go in the evening
to see the Oktoberfest.
Roman actually didn't want to go,
but we said, "You have to see that,
"because this is unbelievable.
"You have never seen 10,000 people in a tent, drunken.
I mean, you must see that. "
And he said, "Okay. "
He said, "I go with you. "
So finally, we went to a special box.
I was with my girlfriend
and two other girlfriends, you know.
Most unfortunately, he was photographed
caught in a pose where sitting in between two girls.
It was quite innocent.
But, you know, photographs... - they say a photograph doesn't lie.
Nothing lies more than a photograph.
Roman always did have bad luck.
And this is the kind of thing that a... -
a cautious person would not have dreamed of doing.
I mean, they would have had themselves photographed
in the cathedral or doing something like that.
That one photograph changed everything.
I took it in to Rittenband
because I figured it was something he ought to see.
And what I told him was, I said,
"You know, Judge, you've made so many mistakes,
"I think, in this case.
"Look, he's giving you the finger. He's flipping you off. "
And I said, "Haven't you had enough of this?"
He says, "What? What?
He's not getting away with that. "
The judge became furious when this appeared in the paper.
He was interviewed by a Hollywood gossip columnist,
Marilyn Beck.
Rittenband told me that he had been duped.
I really believe he had been duped.
In the interview, he said that very possibly
he wanted Polanski back in the country,
and Polanski could be on his way to prison now.
That photograph embarrassed the judge.
Mr. Polanski is supposed to be very focused and intent
when he's working,
and this photograph demonstrated
that at that moment in time, he was not.
Why was he in Germany
when he should have been working hard on a movie?
Could you clear up that apparent misunderstanding?
The judge ordered Roman to come back to the States,
and he called Dino in to testify.
Dino explained through me as the translator
that we were going on with the production,
the preparation of the production,
and that this was just part of the whole thing of making movies.
Mr. De Laurentiis, could you explain to us
why you sent Mr. Polanski to Germany?
Roman was still working when he was in Munich,
because the distributor convinced Roman to come there
and spend a night or go out for a few drinks
and, at the same time, talk about Hurricane.
I don't believe he should.
I don't think the judge knew that or understood that,
and most of all, he didn't believe it.
Okay, now step aside, please.
Let him through.
De Laurentiis testified.
Roman testified.
There was no evidence at all to the contrary.
I rested my case, and the ruling had to be, of course,
that he was there on business purposes,
and that was the finding of the judge.
I told him, "You know, you just have to bear up
"and go through this.
"And remember, at the conclusion of this,
"this case will be over.
"You'll have no further time in custody,
and it will all be behind you. "
That's Dalton?
Yeah, that was Dalton, his lawyer.
Mr. Dalton, has Mr. Polanski talked to you
about his reaction to coming here
for this almost three-month period?
Yes, he has.
Excuse me, I have some business to conduct in here.
Has he indicated to you as to what his feelings are?
Hi. Hi.
Mr. Polanski, do you have any kind of statement at all?
Mr. Polanski, do you have any statement at all?
Mr. Polanski, do you have any statement at all
regarding this 90-day psychiatric stint
that you've come here for?
No.
No statement whatsoever?
What are your immediate thoughts right now?
Any thoughts that you have at all?
Where's the lawyer?
Will he be given any special consideration here?
Nothing other than anybody else that would come in.
When we talk about special housing
or special consideration,
what we're talking about is, everybody that comes in,
we screen them for possible protective custody housing,
but we're concerned for his safety.
There were sketches. There were locations.
You know, people had been up to Chino
and talked to Roman.
I mean, he was prepping the movie from Chino.
Dino and I went to visit Roman.
Dino, of course, was concerned
as to what was going to happen with his film.
I was kind of shocked when we saw Roman.
We were sitting outside at a table outside of the prison.
He was nervous,
always looking over his shoulder to see who was in back of him.
He said that he was concerned
about what the other prisoners would do to him
if they could get near him,
because he was accused of being a child molester.
It was very grim.
And it was a very frightening place.
You know, this is a hard-core... - you know, murderers,
and Roman was not safe there.
People get killed there.
Polanski, of course, was delighted.
He... - he felt, and as properly he should,
that he had lived up to his obligations in the case.
He admitted his guilt.
He served the sentence that had been imposed,
and now it was over,
and he could go on with his life.
I was quite surprised.
Everyone in the criminal justice system is aware
that 90-day diagnostic studies take less than 90 days.
There's not very many people, I would guess,
who have had the experience of it only being 42.
That's not a punishment.
A punishment... -
you know, he was charged with very serious crimes.
You're talking about crimes that... -
that would incur state prison time,
maybe 10, 15, 20 years in state prison.
13-year-old girl,
where he had sexual intercourse with her,
sodomized her, gave her drugs, gave her alcohol.
He got off with nothing.
Mr. Gunson, it's usually the practice
of the district attorney's office to... -
to prosecute the defendant to the fullest degree.
You deviated apparently in this case. Why?
Why did you agree to copping out on the plea
if he should have had a full trialwith the charges?
What do you mean "copping out"?
Between the time that the judge agreed
that the 90-day diagnostic study be his sentence,
there had been lots of new media reports
very critical of the judge.
And now that it appears
that Mr. Polanski will be walking away from a rape
after just serving 42 days
is going to be embarrassing to the judge,
and he needs to overcome it.
My father was at Hillcrest Country Club,
washing his hands in the locker room.
And standing next to him was Judge Rittenband.
And one of the gentlemen at Hillcrest came up to Rittenband
and said, "Are you really gonna
let that little Polish blah-blah-blah off?"
And Rittenband said, "Well, he thinks so, but no way.
"We're gonna put that little blank-blank away
for the rest of his life. "
When we met in his chambers, at this time,
Judge Rittenband said
that he wasn't going to honor the promise that he had made
about releasing Polanski
upon completion of the diagnostic study.
He gave as his reason that he was getting too much criticism.
The judge says that 42 days is not enough time in custody,
that he expected him to be in there 90 days,
and so somehow he has to make up these 48 days
of the intended sentence of 90.
Now, Gunson at this point said,
"If it's 48 more days you want,
why don't you just give him 48 days in the county jail?
"And then you will have accomplished
him serving the full 90 days in jail. "
And Rittenband said, no, he was not willing to do that,
because the perception of a prison sentence
must be maintained for the press.
He told me that if I would come back to court
after the press was gone and the public was gone,
that he would then recall Polanski
and he would be released from prison.
It became obvious to me that he wanted him deported,
because he did not want him around here,
embarrassing the judge any more than he already had.
He wanted Roman to agree
that he would voluntarily waive any rights he may have
regarding deportation.
Rittenband had no jurisdiction over such matters,
and it is illegal to impose an illegal condition
upon somebody serving time in custody,
and so we now are in the category
of actual illegal conduct.
This was getting rather contentious,
as you might understand,
and I said, "If we're gonna do that, judge,
"I want to have a hearing regarding the sentencing
"as we're entitled to do,
"and I want to have witnesses here,
and I want to have a hearing. "
And he said, "Well, I'm gonna sentence him anyway,
"and if you still insist on having your hearing,
"then I may withdraw these things
"that I told you that I would do
"if you went along with this thing
that I'm going to do tomorrow. "
The proceeding was concluded by Judge Rittenband,
as he had done before,
directed me to argue for probation.
He wanted Gunson to again argue for time in custody,
and then he would impose the sentence
that he had discussed with us.
I certainly was not arguing for state prison in chambers.
Nor did I intend to argue
that he should send him to state prison
to participate in this sham that the judge was involved in.
We got up.
We walked out of the room.
I remember saying immediately to Gunson,
"I'm not going to do this again.
"No matter what he does,
I'm not gonna participate in this thing. "
And Gunson said, "I'm not going to do it either. "
As we walked down the aisle,
past the chairs of an empty courtroom at that time,
Doug Dalton turned to me and said,
"Do you think that I can trust the judge?"
And I said something that I wish I hadn't said,
and maybe it did or didn't make a difference,
but I shouldn't have said it.
And what I said to him was, "I don't know why not.
You trusted him once. "
I didn't know what I was going to do the following day.
I did know that I was no longer gonna participate
in a proceeding that was being designed
solely to advance the purposes of Judge Rittenband.
I told Mr. Dalton that I would be available to...
disclose this information to anyone at any place at any time.
I contacted Roman, and I said for them to come to my office.
We discussed what was gonna happen the following morning.
I told him that it was my opinion
that the sentence would be illegal,
that we could probably obtain relief on appeal,
but that would involve a long procedure,
and Polanski would be incarcerated
during that period of time.
I said that the judge had said
that if Roman agreed to waive any deportation hearing
and be deported,
that he would then be released
if he also had by then served 48 days.
Roman said to me, "Can we trust him?"
And I said, "No, we can't trust him.
"We have no idea what he may do.
"We've all agreed that he can no longer be trusted,
and what he represents to us is worthless. "
With that, Roman got up, looked at me,
and I believe he said, "I'll see you guys later,"
and he left the room.
There were two or three other people there,
and I gave Roman an envelope
which I thought was script notes or something else.
The general feeling I had is, "Why is everybody so nervous?"
There was an electricity in the air.
What does it have to do
with what was my conversation with Mr. Polanski?
My conversation with him
is protected by the attorney-client privilege.
I can't divulge to you the substance
or the content of my conversation with him,
only to say what I said in court,
that he did call me this morning at my home,
and he told me he would not be here.
I asked him to call me again,
because I wanted to discuss this with him further
and attempt to persuade him to return.
He said he would call me again.
Doug, the court asked you
whether you thought you might be able
to talk him into coming back.
What was yourresponse?
I said that I thought I had a reasonable chance
of being successful.
How will you try to... -
how will you try to do it?
Can you tell us what makes you think he's out of the country?
No, I can't tell you that.
What happens if he does not come back, Mr. Dalton?
Then the court goes ahead... -
I'm not going to speculate.
Roman Polanski is in seclusion.
His friends say inside this fashionable building
in downtown Paris, where he keeps an apartment.
He skipped the country early yesterday,
only hours before he was to be sentenced
for illegally having sex... -
He had given her champagne and a quaalude.
He has told a friend here his refrigerator is full,
and he does not intend to leave.
Many feel the aura of tragedy and sensationalism
that surrounds Polanski obscures his brilliance as a director.
Judge in the Roman Polanski morals case
said today he intended to send Polanski... -
He says a year of torture is enough.
Has begun proceedings to force Polanski
back to the United States.
However, authorities are not optimistic about succeeding.
I'm advised that the treaty with France
might not allow for his return to this country at our request
to be sentenced on this charge.
Why is that?
As far as I can tell,
the treaty only specifies, number one, rape.
As you know, Mr. Polanski was not convicted of rape.
He was convicted of unlawful sexual intercourse,
and that's a different crime than rape.
Secondly, the treaty specifies that it's discretionary
on the part of France to return French citizens.
In other words, they have an option.
They can or they can't,
depending on how they feel about a particular case
or maybe even possibly a particular person.
Whether the DA succeeds in extraditing Polanski or not,
Judge Laurence Rittenband plans to impose Polanski's sentence
on February 14th,
with or without the filmmaker's presence.
The length of time, of course, would depend upon whether or not
there would be a deportation
or if not deported involuntarily,
he would agree with the director of immigration
to consent in writing to leaving the country,
in which case, any balance of his stay in state prison
would be cut short,
but it was to be no less than the full period of 90 days.
The judge held a press conference.
Shockwaves went through the judicial community.
Ajudge holding a press conference
regarding a pending case: Totally unheard of.
He said that he intended now to sentence Polanski in absentia.
So I prepared the challenge for cause to disqualify a judge.
If you do this, you're required to prove
that there are actual prejudices, you know,
existing by the judge, and you can no... -
you can't have a fair trial or a fair hearing before him.
I showed the declaration to Roger Gunson.
He read it very carefully.
He agreed.
"That's true.
"That's what happened.
I will back you up if that need be. "
The judge was furious.
He knew the statements in the declaration were all true.
He knew that I knew it,
he knew that Gunson knew it,
and he knew that Larry Silver knew parts of it.
And so there was nothing he could do but step aside.
He was through, and he knew it.
I was young, but the way I felt was,
the judge was enjoying the publicity,
and he didn't care about what happened to me,
and he didn't care about what happened to Polanski.
He was, like, orchestrating some little show,
you know, that I didn't want to be in.
I clearly hold no grief for Mr. Polanski,
and obviously what he did to Samantha, my client,
was wrong, outrageous, but nevertheless,
he was supposed to be treated fairly in court,
and he clearly was not.
I'm not surprised that he left under those circumstances.
Really?
Yeah.
Well, Clive, it was a wonderful idea to do this... -
do this interview over... - over this lunch.
But the lunch is getting into a dinner now,
and in case if you have in mind finishing this interview,
I wanted to ask you whether you intend to end on this note,
or do you think there's something more to my life
than my relations with young women?
He rebuilt his life in France
with great honor.
He's a member of the Academy Français.
And in France, he's desired, and in America, he's wanted.
And the Oscar...
goes to Roman Polanski for The Pianist.
The Academy congratulates Roman Polanski
and accepts this award on his behalf.
# La la la la la #
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# Hold me tight #
# As I try #
# To stand up #
# I just drifted #
# Then landed on #
# The soft ground #
# I was a stranger #
# From who knows where #
# When I hear your voice #
# I don't know the words #
# Why the hell should I care? #
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# La la la la la la #
# La la #