Roman Polanski Asks Judge to Dismiss Child-Sex Charge

It's been thirty years since Roman Polanski, the 75-year-old Oscar-winning director of Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby, became a fugitive from justice. He was charged with having unlawful sex with a 13-year-old girl. He acknowledged that he had sex with the girl. And now he is asking the Los Angeles County Superior court to dismiss the 30-year-old charge on the grounds that the prosecutor and judge engaged in "repeated, unlawful and unethical misconduct."

Polanski is requesting that the charge be dropped "in the interest of justice."

Did I mention that Polanski admitted to having unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl? The rape occurred in his buddy Jack Nicholson's house on fashionable Mulholland Drive back in 1977. Polanski allegedly plied the 13-year-old minor with booze and Quaaludes before raping her. He accessed the aspiring model by telling her that he was photographing her for French Vogue. Roman Polanski fled to England on the eve of his sentencing because he believed that the judge was going to throw him in the slammer. You can't fault Polanski for his logic. After all, prison time is indeed a very appropriate punishment for a grown man who rapes a 13-year-old girl.

Why is he asking that the case be dismissed now? It all stems from a documentary broadcast on HBO back in June. The film, which is titled, "Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired," argues that the legal proceedings against Polanski were corrupted by a vindictive, publicity hound of a judge who had improper discussions about the case with a deputy district attorney who had been taken off the case by the prosecution. The film figures prominently in Polanski's motion - in fact, his attorneys are including a DVD of the film and excerpts of reviews in their filing. His attorneys claim that the film contains indisputable evidence of judicial misconduct. It's worth mentioning that Roman Polanski raped a 13-year-old girl and he doesn't want to serve prison time.