Polish court ruling expected in Polański extradition case
PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge
30.10.2015 11:20
A court ruling is expected on Friday in Kraków as to whether the extradition of director Roman Polański from Poland to the United States is permissible concerning a 1977 case of unlawful sex with a minor.
The Kraków court in session on Friday. Photo: PAP/Jacek Bednarczyk
Regardless of the court ruling, the Polish minister of justice will have the final say in the matter.
Polański did not appear in court on Friday morning, apparently for “emotional reasons”, although his lawyers have said that the film-maker is in Kraków.
Court sessions have been held intermittently since February, with Polański appearing on several occasions.
Friday's session, purportedly the final one, will see the last in a series of documents that have been translated into Polish submitted to the court by the defence.
Subsequently, the judge is expected to hear the summing up of both the prosecution and the defence.
Background
Polański fled the US in February 1978, shortly before being sentenced for unlawful sex with a 13-year-old girl. He settled in Paris, where he has been chiefly based ever since.
In 2009, while entering Switzerland to receive a prize at the Zurich Film Festival, he was arrested, as a US request for his extradition had been freshly submitted. However, Swiss authorities ultimately backed down after keeping him under house arrest for several months (he has a villa in Gstaad).
The director returned to France, but he has frequently visited Poland, where he had grown up in a secular Jewish family in the city of Kraków.
He has been free to travel between France and Poland since the case was taken up by the Polish court, following a request from American authorities.
Polański hopes to make his next film in Poland. The film is an exploration of the Dreyfus Affair, a notorious miscarriage of justice concerning a French-Jewish officer, prior to World War I. (nh/rk)