Anti-Semitism Got Polanski

As Roman Polanski faces months in jail, Hollywood elite rally around him

(NEWSER) - The sister of Roman Polanski’s murdered second wife, Sharon Tate, says his crime was not rape. "There's rape and then there's rape,” Debra Tate tells MSNBC, and what happened between Polanski and his 13-year-old victim was “a consensual matter.” More from the Polanski saga:

• Fake IDs, disguises, maybe a bad dye job? Not for Roman Polanski. His life on the lam has been one of luxury, from a penthouse in a glitzy Paris shopping district to a vacation chalet at a swanky Swiss ski resort, reports the New York Daily News.

Edith Vogelhut reports new claims, from 1974, to DA

(NEWSER) - Now that Roman Polanski is free in Switzerland , another victim is coming forward—and this one claims she was “anally raped repeatedly” by the director in 1974. Former model Edith Vogelhut, at the time a 21-year-old Glamour magazine editor, tells Radar it started when she met Polanski at a 1974 dinner party also attended by stars like Warren Beatty. Polanski took her to Jack Nicholson’s house, where she “kind of knew we were going to have sex,” but “did not expect to be sodomized.” More»

Los Angeles has more pressing problems; tragic director has been punished enough

(NEWSER) - Whether you side for or against Roman Polanski, one has to wonder why the state of California is “stalking an aging, 76-year-old man who has admitted his guilt and was long ago forgiven by his victim,” writes Patrick Goldstein in the Los Angeles Times. California’s legislature is chopping the state's prison budget and grappling with overcrowding—an especially inauspicious time for the LA County district attorney's office to be spending some of our few remaining tax dollars seeing if it can finally put Roman Polanski behind bars." More»

Plus: six other stars who have used the word insensitively

(NEWSER) - Johnny Depp really stepped in it in a recent Vanity Fair interview, when he compared photo shoots to rape. "Well, you just feel like you’re being raped somehow," he said. "Raped … It feels like a kind of weird—just weird, man." Anti-rape activists, of course, were not amused. "While photos may feel at times intrusive, being photographed in no way compares to rape," a spokesperson for the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network tells Radar . Depp also got called out on blogs . But he was quick to apologize in a statement today, admitting to his "poor choice of words." More»

Designer handed a suspended sentence

(NEWSER) - He managed to escape the six months in jail he was facing, but John Galliano didn't manage to escape a guilty verdict. A Paris court today convicted the former Christian Dior designer for making "public insults based on origin, religious affiliation, race, or ethnicity." He was given a suspended sentence of $8,400 in fines, though he will not have to pay it, reports the AP . Galliano blamed the incidents , which he said he couldn't recall, on booze and drugs. (In related news, it looks like he still has one fan ...) More»