Woody Allen, Roman Polanski and the Sex-Offending Celeb: To Forgive or Not?

On Sunday, the Golden Globes honored filmmaker Woody Allen with a tribute—which son Ronan responded to with a swiping tweet: ""Missed the Woody Allen tribute," he wrote. "Did they put the part where a woman publicly confirmed he molested her at age 7 before or after Annie Hall?" Similarly, last year brought a reminder of director Roman Polanski's arrest for drugging, raping and sodomizing 13-year-old Samantha Geimer when Geimer published her side of the story, "The Girl: A Life in the Shadow of Roman Polanski." And she, for one, seemed to have found forgiveness — just as many of both filmmaker's Hollywood pals have over the years. But why have Allen and Polanski attained such public pardon when so many other famous offenders (some with less-extreme offenses) have not? Here, a review of some of those other cases, with verdicts on the forgiveness factor.—Beth Greenfield, Shine Staff