Polanski wins libel case against Vanity Fair
The 71-year-old film director sued over a July 2002 Vanity Fair story which said that he made a pass at a woman - model Beatte Telle - in Elaine's restaurant in New York, just after the August 1969 tragedy.
Tate, a 26-year-old actress, who was eight months pregnant, died with four others at her Californian home at the hands of Charles Manson's 'Family'.
John Kelsey-Fry QC told Mr Justice Eady and a London jury that Polanski had been "monstrously libelled for the sake of a lurid anecdote."
The article, by AE Hochner, recounted an onlooker, Lewis Lapham, as saying about Polanski: "Fascinated by his performance, I watched as he slid his hand inside her thigh and began a long honeyed spiel which ended with the promise 'And I will make another Sharon Tate out of you'."
The jury found publishers Condé Nast had not proved the words complained of were substantially true.
Polanski was not in court because of his fear of extradition to the US following his flight from the country in 1978 while awaiting sentence for having sex with a 13-year-old girl.
He was following proceedings via videolink from Paris - the first time a libel case before a jury has proceeded in this way.
The move followed a House of Lords ruling in February that Polanski should not be denied access to justice because of his fear of being extradited.
In a statement, he said: "It goes without saying that, whilst the whole episode is a sad one, I am obviously pleased with the jury's verdict today.
"Three years of my life have been interrupted. Three years within which I have had no choice but to relive the horrible events of August 1969, the murders of my wife, my unborn child and my friends.
"Many untruths have been published about me, most of which I have ignored, but the allegations printed in the July 2002 edition of Vanity Fair could not go unchallenged."
He added: "The memory of my late wife Sharon Tate was at the forefront of my mind in bringing this action."
The magazine accepted the incident did not occur when Polanski was on his way back to Hollywood for Ms Tate's funeral but maintained it took place about two weeks later.
It argued that, in any case, he should not receive any damages as his reputation had already been ruined by his 1977 conviction and promiscuous past.
Polanski, backed by actress Mia Farrow, said the incident simply never happened and dismissed Lapham's version of events as "an abominable lie".
Mia Farrow said she arranged to meet Polanski for dinner at Elaine's. She said Polanski brushed off two women who tried to flirt with him and was unable to talk of anything but his wife's murder. They left the restaurant and "started walking around and around the block".
She believed she and her then partner, Andre Previn, took Polanski back to his hotel. "Of this I can be sure - of his frame of mind when we there, of what we talked about, of his utter sense of loss, of despair and bewilderment and shock and love - a love he had lost."
It is understood that Condé Nast faces a costs bill estimated at up to £1.5 million (€2.15m) - with the judge ordering that £175,000 (€252,000) should be within 14 days.
Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter said afterwards: "I find it amazing that a man who lives in France can sue a magazine that is published in America in a British courtroom.
"As a father of four children, one of whom is a 12-year-old daughter, I find it equally outrageous that this story is considered defamatory, given the fact that Mr Polanski cannot be here because he slept with a 13-year-old girl a quarter of a century ago.
Lapham, now editor of Harper's Magazine, told the court he was sitting between financier Edward Perlberg and Mr Perlberg's then girlfriend, Miss Telle, when Polanski pulled up a chair between them.
Lapham said: "At one point he had his hand on her leg and said to her 'I can put you in movies'."
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