"Red Notice" for Roman Polanski issued by INTERPOL

Immediately after a Swiss federal court ordered the release of famed film director Roman Polanski on bail, INTERPOL issued an alert on Friday reminding all 188 member countries that he remains the subject of a valid Red Notice, an international wanted persons notice, issued at the request of the US Department of Justice.

The message, sent by INTERPOL's General Secretariat headquarters in Lyon, France, also requested each of its National Central Bureaus, or NCBs, to ensure that border protection agencies are advised of Polanski's Red Notice status, which is a request for all countries to identify or locate an individual with a view to their arrest and extradition.

"Given Mr. Polanski's history of international travel while defying a judicial order, a $4.5 million bail and an electronic bracelet does not mean that law enforcement should let its global guard down," said INTERPOL Secretary General Ronald K. Noble.

"Mr. Polanski has given us more than 30 years of proof that he does not feel bound to respect any court decision with which he does not agree," said Noble.

In March 1977, a Los Angeles County Grand Jury returned an indictment against Polanski, charging him with furnishing a controlled substance to a minor, lewd and lascivious act upon a child under fourteen, unlawful sexual intercourse, rape by use of drugs, perversion and sodomy on a person who was underage.
 

Polanski fled from the US in 1978, after he had pleaded guilty to a charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl, and has eluded arrest since that time until his recent arrest in Switzerland. In fact, while a fugitive, Polanski continued his filmmaking career.

"The world law enforcement community should do all in its power to make sure that the Swiss judicial process is allowed to run its course, and if Mr. Polanski defies the conditions of his release, no country should welcome, offer safe haven to, or defend his conduct," Secretary General Noble concluded.

Ironically, it was Roman Polanski's motion picture Chinatown, a film that addressed statutory rape, which garnered him international praise. The film starred Jack Nicholson as a private detective attempting to aid a woman (played by Faye Dunaway) whose father (played by John Huston) raped and impregnated her while she was a teenager.