2nd Official Tate-LaBianca Murders Blog

  CBC News With files from The Associated Press Saturday, October 3, 2009 Film director Roman Polanski leaves court on Oct. 25, 1977, in Santa Monica, Calif. He has been on the run since fleeing charges of having sex with a minor. (Nick Ut/Associated Press) Court records show film director Roman Polanski, who was arrested in Switzerland last Saturday and is fighting extradition to the U.S. for having sex with a minor, had agreed to pay his victim more than $500,000 US to settle a lawsuit. A $500,000 deal was hammered out 15 years after he fled the U.S. in 1978. But it appears the director did not pay up on the initial deal. The last court filing, in 1996, shows a judge boosted the required payment, which includes interest, to $604,000.   Samantha Geimer, shown in 2008, has pleaded for the courts to drop charges against Polanski, who admitted having sex with her when she was only 13. (Peter Kramer/File/AP) Polanski pleaded guilty in a California court 32 years...

From Times Online September 29, 2009 David Charter, Zurich (ittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images) Details of attempts to arrest Roman Polanski half a dozen times around the world since 1978 have emerged today as his lawyers filed a request for his immediate release on bail from a Swiss cell. Authorities in Britain, Canada, France, Israel and Thailand had been asked to detain the film-maker over the years before he was held at Zurich airport on Saturday, the Los Angeles District Attorney's office said. The release of a list of extradition attempts came in response to claims that the LA authorities had not bothered to pursue Mr Polanski after he fled the US in 1978 to escape sentencing for having unlawful sexual intercourse with an under-age girl. Mr Polanski is said to have felt no qualms about visiting Zurich Film Festival to pick up a lifetime achievement award, partly because his lawyers believed that he was no longer actively being sought. Roman P...