Negotiations Continue in 20-Year-Old Polanski Case

Amid unusual secrecy, authorities have held courthouse negotiations with the attorney for fugitive film director Roman Polanski in an effort to secure his surrender nearly 20 years after he fled the United States to avoid sentencing for having sex with a 13-year-old girl.

Interviews and a review of court documents Tuesday show that Polanski attorney Doug Dalton and Deputy Dist. Atty. Roger Gunson have appeared at the downtown Criminal Courthouse three times since December for closed-door conferences before a Superior Court judge about Polanski’s case. In addition, a computer entry at the courthouse includes a scheduled Jan. 31, 1998, court conference, according to court officials.

Judge Larry Fidler, who has presided over two of the in-chamber conferences, refused to comment on the case Tuesday and the attorneys who have appeared before the judge did not return repeated phone calls for interviews.

Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office, would not comment on the possibility of a resolution to the case. Instead, Gibbons issued a prepared statement apparently aimed at quelling speculation that a deal had been struck allowing Polanski to avoid jail time if he surrenders on the fugitive warrant.

“Our position has always remained the same--that Mr. Polanski must surrender,” Gibbons said. “We have not agreed to any sentence.”

Twenty years ago, Polanski, then 42, was charged with having unlawful sexual intercourse with the Woodland Hills teenager. After agreeing to a plea in the case, Polanski fled to London to avoid a sentence of six months to 50 years. In his autobiography, Polanski said he left the United States after a judge, now deceased, reneged on an agreement allowing the film director to serve no more than 90 days in prison.

Court records show that on Dec. 5, 1996, Gunson and Dalton met in Fidler’s chambers about the Polanski case and, although no record of that meeting was available, a court document said the case was scheduled to return to court in January 1997.

A second court document, dated Dec. 20, 1996, shows that the attorneys again appeared, in another courtroom, when the case was ordered transferred “for all purposes” to Fidler.

Then, in January of this year, another closed-door hearing was held before Fidler.

Fidler’s clerk insisted Tuesday that the case file has never been in the judge’s courtroom. But other courthouse employees said Fidler’s court ordered the file retrieved from archives just last month.

Although Polanski’s attorney and prosecutors can discuss a possible agreement for his surrender, a judge would make the final decision on whether the director of such films as “Chinatown” would have to serve prison time.