In the documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired , Polanski’s prosecutor David Wells says that he improperly discussed the director’s case with Judge Laurence Rittenbrand 30 years ago. Now he’s saying that’s all a lie. According to the Los Angeles Times , in the film Wells “claimed that he suggested a way that the judge could sentence the director to prison by sending him to Chino State Prison for a 90-day ‘diagnostic testing,’ despite a probation officer’s recommendation that Polanski serve no time behind bars.”
Now Wells is telling Marcia Clark at the Daily Beast , “I lied. I know I shouldn’t have done it, but I did. The director of the documentary told me it would never air in the States. I thought it made a better story if I said I’d told the judge what to do.” As I noted in my piece about the Polanski case , the director’s lawyers were trying to use Wells’ comments, and Rittenbrand’s supposed actions in response to them, to get the case dropped earlier this year. And so this is further proof that like I said, what seems to have gotten Polanski in trouble is his celebrity hubris, not the D.A.’s meddling or judicial misconduct. Judge Rittenbrand (who has since died and so couldn’t defend himself when Wells smeared him in the film) saw photos of Polanski cavorting with young women at an Oktoberfest before his 90-day psychiatric evaluation, and felt that Polanski was making a fool of him and the judicial system.
