Roman Polanski Petition

Veteran filmmakers Marco Bellocchio, Wim Wenders, and Claude Lelouch; Oscar winners Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, and Pedro Almodóvar; the French Film Academy; the Cannes Film Festival; and hundreds of other individuals and organizations have signed a petition demanding the release of Roman Polanski, who was arrested by Swiss police — at the behest of the American Justice Department — following his arrival at the Zurich airport on Sept. 26. Polanski was headed to the Zurich Film Festival, where he was to have received a Lifetime Achievement Award.
In 1978, Polanski pleaded guilty to having unlawful intercourse with a minor (13-year-old Samantha Gailey, now Geimer) at a Los Angeles court, but fled to France before he could be sentenced. His court [...]