The Swiss’ argument rests on their request to see some of the paperwork of secret testimony in the case where the judge was going to neg the original plea bargain, paperwork which the Justice Department and the LA courts refused to give them. So in the determination of the Swiss courts, unless there was evidence otherwise, the time served in the psych ward was Polanski’s full sentence, so he’s a free man as far as they’re concerned. In other words, the LA courts messed this one up big time.
OTOH, just because a defendant and the State agree to a plea bargain in a case (and Polanski pled to a much lesser crime than he is alleged to have committed), the presiding judge doesn’t have to accept it, and in Polanski’s case, the judge had decided that 42 days in a psych ward was not going to be time served. When Polanski would come back to court for a hearing, the judge was going to put the plea bargain aside and try him for the more serious charge of rape. Polanski got wind of the judge’s decision and fled.