Oops! Polanski’s appeal weakens still further
It turns out that one of the pillars of the Polanski defense (and the Polanski defenders’ arguments) has crumbled.
In an HBO documentary made last year about the 1977 Polanski rape case, the shocking assertion was made by a former prosecutor David Wells that he improperly colluded with the judge on sentencing. But now Wells pulls an Emily Litella and says “never mind.”
Wells apparently used a certain amount of creativity when he spoke for the film cameras and made his previous claim of wrongdoing. His excuse? He was asssured the HBO piece would air only in France (what does that say of his opinion of the French?)
Here’s how Wells tells it:
David Wells, the prosecutor who last year told an HBO documentary that he colluded with Mr Polanski’s judge to increase his jail sentence, has now called that claim a complete fabrication. “I’m a guy who cuts to the chase,” he said yesterday. “I lied.” …
He’d been persuaded to embellish his story after the makers of the documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired ”“ which was co-produced by the BBC and won an Emmy for director Marina Zenovich ”“ said it would only be shown in France. “I know I shouldn’t have done it, but I did,” admitted Mr Wells. “The director told me it would never air in the States. I thought it made a better story if I said I’d told the judge what to do,” he told legal journalist Marcia Clark.
I’m wondering what that “persuasion” by the documentary makers involved. Did they, for instance, know the truth, and suggest that he lie in order to strengthen the case for film darling Polanski? Or were they innocent dupes?
Hmm. I am no fan by any means of Polanski’s, but I think we should be very careful about believing ANYTHING Wells says from here on in, whether he’s speaking for the cameras or not. All we know for sure about him at this point is that he’s willing to lie.
The revelations of Elizabeth Smart are more trouble for Polanski in the sense that people can’t help but link the behavior of one child rapist with another.
Yesterday, the home page for Toys ‘R’ Us prominently featured a picture of Whoopi Goldberg holding a young girl with Downs’ Syndrome in her lap, as well as a video in which she described herself as a child advocate — all part of a promotion of playthings for children with special needs. Today — Whoopsi! She’s gone, replaced by a picture of Buzz Lightyear and some entirely different promotion. (I imagine they thought that the risk that Buzz would say something indefensible on a talk show was fairly slim.) The Whoopi images have suddenly and unaccountably become hard to find. I can’t imagine why Toys ‘R’ Us might have had second thoughts about associating itself with Whoopi Goldberg . . . . can you?
Corporate America comes under fire from the left for their supposed immorality and lack of compassion. But sometimes it takes Toys ‘R Us or the like to enforce community standards when no one else will. That they do it for business reasons is irrelevant. It only illustrates how in Burkean fashion, markets operate to illustrate what a society’s actual values are.
Did he actually lie lie, or did he merely just lie? Better check with Whoopi.
There is embellish, and then there is embellish embellish.
It’s hard to believe a prosecutor would say that under any circumstances if it wasn’t true so I’m not sure I’m willing to take his word for it now that it wasn’t.
Neo,
Not “persuasion”, but “documentary” makers.
At least it stops the gary glitter jokes…
I assume Mr. Wells is confident that he is well-connected. I am about the most obscure lawyer in Michigan and I have a feeling that if I had publicly accused a judge of improper collusion in a sentencing the state bar’s grievance committee would take a very dim view of it.
I don’t know his state’s rules but that sort of statement, especially when it’s absolutely false, is not only considered defamatory, it goes far beyond any acceptable legal practice.
I don’t think I need to say much about his belief that bringing a judge and the American legal system into disrepute in a foreign country is OK.
My favorite part of Whoopi Goldberg’s statement was when asked if she’d approve of her fourteen year old daughter having sex she said, “probably not.” She’s willing to consider a child of hers that age having sex and a topic for consideration. I wonder if she takes the same view on the daughter’s table manners.
“I wonder if she takes the same view on the daughter’s table manners.”
I of course don’t know what goes on in that household, but often, people like Whoopi (immensely rich celebrities who are also self absorbed narcissists) probably have no IDEA what their child’s table manners are like on a day-to-day basis.
Nanny, Au Pair, Cook, Housekeeper, et al….they take care of the day-to-day routine with the kid. When she is at home for holidays and not away at the $75,000/year elite boarding school. Mommy Dearest “schedules” in some “quality time” a few hours here and there during the week. Comes to watch the kid’s tennis lesson, etc.
Alex Bensky: Does it matter at all that the judge in question in this case is deceased?
And would that be THE Marcia Clark, she of the subtle legal mind and constantly changing hairdos?
A youthful error? Yes, perhaps.
But he’s been punished for this lapse–
For decades exiled from LA
He knows, as he wakes up each day,
He’ll miss the movers and the shakers.
He’ll never get to see the Lakers.
For just one old and small mischance,
He has to live in Paris, France.
He’s suffered slurs and other stuff.
Has he not suffered quite enough?
How can these people get so riled?
He only raped a single child.
Why make him into some Darth Vader
For sodomizing one eighth grader?
This man is brilliant, that’s for sure–
Authentically, a film auteur.
He gets awards that are his due.
He knows important people, too–
Important people just like us.
And we know how to make a fuss.
Celebrities would just be fools
To play by little people’s rules.
So Roman’s banner we unfurl.
He only raped one little girl.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20091026/trillin
logern: That’s a good one. I’ve always enjoyed Trillin’s food articles, and I thought highly of his tribute to his wife.
I especially like the lines “Celebrities would just be fools/To play by little people’s rules.”
Also, it always irks me that people make so much of the idea that Polanski was cruelly “exiled” from LA. I wonder how many of them know that he’s not a US citizen.