Victim in Roman Polanski rape case expected to take new legal step on his behalf

In the 33 years since she accused Roman Polanski of rape, Samantha Geimer has publicly forgiven the acclaimed director, accused the American justice system of mistreating him and urged a dismissal of his still pending criminal case.

On Friday, Geimer is expected to take yet another step on Polanski’s behalf – asking that a Los Angeles court force U.S. authorities to abandon their ongoing attempt to extradite the filmmaker from Switzerland.

In papers served on Polanski’s lawyers Wednesday and expected to be filed in Superior Court this morning, Geimer’s lawyer contends that the L.A. County district attorney’s office violated the state's victims rights statute by not consulting with her prior to making the extradition request.

Now a married mother living in Hawaii, Geimer was 13 when she told authorities Polanski raped and sodomized her during a photo shoot at Jack Nicholson’s house.

Geimer's attorney, Lawrence Silver, wrote that at a Friday hearing he planned to cite Marsy’s Law – a 2008 statute passed by ballot initiative – that specifically guarantees crime victims a number of rights, including the right “to reasonable notice of and to reasonably confer with the prosecuting agency, upon request, regarding ... the determination whether to extradite the defendant.”
The attorney wrote that in a July letter to the deputy district attorney handling the case, he made clear that Geimer wanted to meet with prosecutors and planned to “exercise every right that she may have under the Victim’s Bill of Rights.”

No one from the district attorney’s office contacted Geimer – whose pro-Polanski feelings were widely known – at that time or in September when the director was arrested in Zurich on a three-decades-old arrest warrant, according to the papers.

Prosecutors later submitted a formal extradition request to Swiss authorities, and the director is being held under house arrest pending a decision by the courts there.

“The failure to give notice to and to confer prior to a determination to extradite the defendant ... is a violation to the California Constitution,” Silver wrote.

A spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office said Wednesday that the office had not yet received Geimer’s filing and could not comment.

Geimer began advocating for Polanski after reaching a settlement to her civil suit against him for sexual assault and other claims. Under the terms of the confidential 1993 agreement, he agreed to pay her at least $500,000.

Judge Peter Espinoza, the supervising judge of the Superior Court’s criminal division, will hear arguments at Friday’s proceeding concerning Polanski’s request to be sentenced in absentia. A state appellate court proposed such a sentencing last month as a way to air the filmmaker’s claims of judicial and prosecutorial misconduct in the original handling of the case without requiring Polanski to return to the U.S.

Prosecutors have opposed the measure, saying it amounts to letting a fugitive dictate court proceedings. In her papers, Geimer said she favored sentencing in absentia.

It was the desire of Geimer’s parents to spare her the ordeal of testifying at a public trial that led to a plea deal regarded then and now as exceptionally favorable to Polanski. He agreed to plead guilty to a single count of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor – a statutory rape charge – and prosecutors said they would drop rape, sodomy, oral copulation and other counts at sentencing.

That proceeding did not happen because Polanski fled to Europe. His lawyers contend he left because the trial judge reneged on an agreement to count the 42 days the director had spent in prison for diagnostic testing as his entire sentence


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Shepard Fairey to face criminal investigation in Associated Press case

A judge in New York revealed today that artist Shepard Fairey is facing a criminal investigation in connection with his admitted misconduct in the ongoing legal case with the Associated Press, according to reports.

Alvin K. Hellerstein, a federal district judge, reportedly made the revelation today as part of a hearing where lawyers for Fairey and the AP were present.

A spokesman for the AP said in a statement issued this evening that the news organization has received a grand jury subpoena related to Fairey's misconduct during the case.

A lawyer representing Fairey did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In October, the L.A. artist admitted that he knowingly submitted false images and deleted others during the case in an attempt to conceal the fact that the AP had correctly identified the photo that Fairey had used as a reference for his "Hope" poster of then-Sen. Barack Obama.

In February, the AP claimed that Fairey violated copyright laws when he used one of its images as the basis for the poster.  In response, the artist filed a lawsuit against the AP, claiming that he was protected under fair use.

At the time, Fairey claimed that he used a different photo as the inspiration for his poster. He has since admitted that the AP is correct about which photo he used.

Following today's hearing, the AP published a report stating that the judge revealed the grand jury probe in a handwritten note denying a request by a Fairey attorney that a hearing relating to a copyright lawsuit be closed.


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