Roger Gunson’s Unsealed Polanski Testimony Offers Not Bombshells, But Details And A Path Through The Thicket
deadline.comAfter 12 years in a lock box, former Los Angeles County prosecutor Roger Gunson’s conditional testimony in the Roman Polanski sex case was unsealed by court order on Thursday, and copies of a transcript were made available on Sunday night.What the several hundred pages of testimony—taken over three days in 2010—finally delivered was not a series of bombshell revelations.
Since Polanski fled the country before sentencing in 1978, constant examination of the case has left little room for surprises.Rather, Gunson’s testimony provided a long, highly detailed, deeply informed recap both of Polanski’s crime—which involved the rape of a minor—and of alleged judicial and prosecutorial misconduct that followed it.Perhaps the most striking details—other than blunt descriptions of the crime, which would surely be repeated if Polanski ever came to trial—involved Gunson’s account of having been blocked by superiors in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office from asking that Judge Laurence J.
Rittenband, now deceased, be disqualified from the case for misconduct. That failed effort occurred in August of 1977, when Gunson, then in charge of prosecuting Polanski, became dismayed by Rittenband’s habit of soliciting information and opinions outside of outside of normal judicial channels.
Gunson was sufficiently alarmed to draft a 20-page affidavit seeking recusal. But two superiors—after having affirmed its claims in a discussion with Rittenband—declined to file it, without explanation.
Read more on deadline.com