GENEVA -- Roman Polanski will remain in a jail outside Zurich for at least three more days until he meets the security conditions of his bail, a Swiss official said Friday.
Polanski wouldn't be placed under house arrest in Switzerland before Monday, because he has yet to fulfill all the requirements to ensure that he stays in his chalet in the Swiss luxury resort of Gstaad, Justice Ministry spokesman Folco Galli said.
Galli did not elaborate, but the 76-year-old director must post $4.5 million bail, surrender his identity papers and be fitted with a monitoring bracelet.
Polanski cannot leave the chalet because the ministry is still deciding whether to extradite him to the United States for having sex in 1977 with a 13-year-old girl. Authorities in Los Angeles want him sentenced after 31 years as a fugitive.
Doubts over Polanski's whereabouts were answered Friday when the filmmaker's lawyer Lorenz Erni entered a prison in Winterthur, a city 16 miles northeast of Zurich.
Erni declined to speak to reporters after his 80-minute visit in the prison, where Polanski is being treated as an extradition detainee with more privileges than prisoners who have committed crimes in Switzerland.
A former Winterthur inmate said he was held in a cell next to Polanski, and that the Oscar-winning director of "Rosemary's Baby," "Chinatown" and "The Pianist" was given better treatment than others.
"For example, he could regularly call his wife or his lawyers," Yussi Akram told local Radio Top, adding that Polanski also chatted regularly with prison guards and could press an emergency button when he needed something.
White House Christmas tree arrives from W. Va.
WASHINGTON -- The White House is open for Christmas.
A day after celebrating Thanksgiving, first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Malia and Sasha received the official White House Christmas tree: an 18 1/2-foot Douglas fir delivered from a farm in Shepherdstown, W.Va., by traditional horse-drawn carriage.
Growers Eric and Gloria Sundback officially presented the tree to the Obamas on Friday.
It's the fourth time one of their trees has become the official White House tree.
"It's big enough for Sasha to climb in, I think," Sundback joked after the Obamas walked from the North Portico of the White House to the driveway where the tree was tied up and lying in the carriage, pulled up the driveway from Pennsylvania Avenue by a pair of Belgian draft horses with red Christmas bows tied to their tails. A sign affixed to the side of the carriage said "White House Christmas Tree 2009."
"We're excited," Mrs. Obama told the Sundbacks.
Asked by reporters whether the tree was the biggest she ever had, the first lady said: "Yeah, I think this wins."
The 12-foot-wide tree is destined for the oval-shaped Blue Room on the State Floor of the White House, where scores of volunteers will decorate it. The tree is the star attraction of Christmas at the White House, and will be oohed and aahed over by the thousands of people who will stream through in December for holiday parties and public tours of the executive mansion.
The tree, which the Sundbacks planted in 1996, was hand-picked on Oct. 20 on a visit to the Sundback's farm by retired Rear Adm. Stephen Rochon, the White House chief usher, and Dale Haney, superintendent of the White House grounds. It was cut down on Wednesday.
