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D.A.’s Office Urges Transcript Unsealing in Polanski Case
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The Office of Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón yesterday advised the Court of Appeal for this district that it does not oppose the public release of a deposition taken in 2010 of the prosecutor in the 1977-78 statutory-rape case against film director Roman Polanski concerning alleged judicial misconduct in that proceeding.
Gascón declared yesterday:
“This case has been described by the courts as ‘one of the longest-running sagas in California criminal justice history. For years, this office has fought the release of information that the victim and public have a right to know.
“After careful consideration of the victim’s wishes, the unique and extraordinary circumstances that led to his conditional exam and my commitment to transparency and accountability for all in the justice system, my office has determined it to be in the interest of justice to agree to the unsealing of these transcripts.”
2009 Opinion
As a practical matter, however, it is doubtful that an unsealing would shed much light on whether Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Lawrence Rittenband, who died in 1993, was guilty of improper conduct in the case. Allegations that he planned a sentencing maneuver geared to generating the image in news reports that he had sternly sentenced the celebrity defendant while actually intending only a short period of incarceration were set forth in detail in a Dec. 21, 2009 Div. Seven opinion.
That opinion, by then-Justice Laurie D. Zelon (now retired), affirmed the decision by then-Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Peter Espinoza (now director of the Los Angeles County’s Office of Diversion and Reentry of the Health Department) denying a motion to dismiss the prosecution in the long-lingering case. Espinoza applied the fugitive disentitlement doctrine, declining to act on the motion unless Polanski, who fled the United States in 1978, presented himself at a sentencing hearing.
Polanski had pled guilty August 1977 to one count of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor; was sent to a prison for a 90-day diagnostic study, pursuant to Penal Code §1203.03, but was released after 42 days, and fled to France before a sentencing hearing before Rittenband. The judge, according to accounts which Zelon recited, intended to sentence Polanski to state prison, in open court, with the undisclosed intent of retaining jurisdiction and modifying the sentence within 120 days to permit his release upon condition of deportation.
Zelon’s Comments
Zelon observed in the 2009 opinion that Polanski’s allegations of judicial and prosecutorial misconduct “urgently require full exploration and then, if indicated, curative action for the abuses alleged here.” She commented:
“Time continues to pass, and the delay in addressing this matter has already removed one participant from the ranks of available witnesses for an evidentiary hearing on the judicial and prosecutorial misdeeds that have been alleged here. The passage of more time before this case’s final resolution will further hamper the search for truth and the delivery of any appropriate relief, and it will also prolong the agony that the lack of finality in this matter continues to cause [victim] Samantha Geimer. We exhort all participants in this extended drama to place the integrity of the criminal justice system above the desire to punish any one individual, whether for his offense or for his flight.”
In response, Espinoza ordered that a deposition be taken of Roger Gunson, who had been the prosecutor in the case, and is retired, in order to preserve his testimony (in light of his illness). The judge required that the transcript be sealed.
In response to the current writ petition, Gascón’s office initially opposed an unsealing. Last December, Deputy District Attorney Michelle Hanisee (president of the Association of Deputy District Attorneys) said in a memorandum of points and authorities:
“Granting public access to the deposition testimony from a conditional examination that has not yet been admitted in court could harm the strong public interest in preserving the availability of material testimony in criminal trials.”
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Sam Ohta denied the motion, and a petition for a writ of mandate was filed in the Court of Appeal on April 14.
Geimer’s Letter
Samantha Geimer—who was raped and sodomized by Polanski at age 13–in a June 20 letter to Deputy District Attorney Diana M. Teran, Gascón’s director of prosecution support operations, said, in part:
“I have been actively advocating for the release of this testimony since 2014 and for an investigation into the misconduct in my case for far longer. My request has repeatedly been denied. I’ve been told that Mr. Polanski must surrender himself to the American authorities in order to have the misconduct in this case investigated. Further, the testimony must remain sealed unless there is an investigation. I believe this answer is disingenuous.”
She went on to say:
“The lack of resolution of this case has haunted my family for decades….The contempt and callousness of previous administrations towards myself and my family remains fresh in my memory. I had given up hope that anyone would seek the truth in this matter, whatever the testimony contains.
“In closing l request in the strongest possible terms that you allow Roger Gunson’s testimony to be unsealed. It is the interest of the public and the victim in this case. I ask for the consideration and respect I have been denied until this time. I appreciate deeply the opportunity to make this statement and hope my words have informed and moved you.”
A copy of that letter was attached by Gascón’s office to a press release that was issued yesterday. Also attached was a letter from Geimer to Gascón’s predecessor, Jackie Lacey, and a letter sent to the Court of Appeal on Gascón’s behalf by Deputy District Attorney Tracie Whitney. It says:
“Courtroom evidentiary hearings are traditionally open to the public….This is significant to presumptive First Amendment disclosure rules….Given that the Gunson deposition was effectively a post-plea evidentiary hearing on judicial and prosecutorial misconduct rather than a conditional examination to preserve the testimony of a vulnerable victim or witness, the transcript should be unsealed.”
She added:
“Ultimately, the public and the victim have the right to know and scrutinize the transcript as it related to the conduct of judicial officers and prosecutors who served on their behalf.”
Former District Attorney Steve Cooley commented yesterday:
“The Polanski case has been reviewed by six district Attorneys from John Van de Kamp to Jackie Lacey, superior court judges, and an appellate court. Now DA Gascón has an epiphany and wants to do something contrary. This is pathetic grandstanding by a desperate dysfunctional erstwhile prosecutor.”
He added:
“I suggest Gascón actually read the Grand Jury testimony of the victim in this case. He might want to change his mind about benefiting child rapist Polanski in Polanski’s efforts to obtain an even better result than he already had.”
The case is Wasson v. Superior Court, B319704.
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