Those who believe Roman Polanski shouldn't be extradited are wrong

At times, Roman Polanski has had to bear more than most. His father was sent to a concentration camp, his mother died in Auschwitz. When barely into double figures he escaped the Warsaw Ghetto and survived as a result of the kindness of strangers. His heavily pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, was brutally murdered. He has achieved remarkable success from tough beginnings, but so have many people. There is nothing in Polanksi’s setbacks that excuses what he did in 1977.

Polanski was 44 when, at the end of a photographic shoot for a magazine he was guest editing, he plied a 13 year old girl with drink and drugs and raped and sodomised her. It was not consensual. Indeed, the girl has to be persuaded to return following Polanski’s inappropriate behaviour in an earlier photographic session.

He was charged with rape by use of drugs, perversion, sodomy, lewd and lascivious acts upon a child under 14, and furnishing a controlled substance (methaqualone) to a minor. These charges were dismissed under the terms of his plea bargain and he pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.

When on bail awaiting sentence he left the US never to return. He has been hiding out in France (where he is a citizen) and avoiding going anywhere where he thought he might be arrested.

It is 40 years since Sharon Tate’s murder yet the passage of time has not diminished our revulsion at that crime. Why should the passage of 32 years diminish our revulsion at a 44 year old man’s abuse of a 13 year old girl.

He should be extradited and serve time in prison, presumably until he dies.