LOS ANGELES -- Roman Polanski has no plans ever to return to the United States, according to a new legal filing in his campaign to have a long-ago rape case dismissed.

His lawyer said in the document filed Tuesday in Los Angeles that Polanski's court battle has a different motivation.

He said the fugitive director wants to provide a legacy for the justice system by showing that judicial misconduct cannot go unpunished.

The legal brief also argues that Polanski does not need to be present for the court to rule on his motion to dismiss a 3-decade-old rape charge.

The 75-year-old, Oscar-winning movie director lives in France, where he fled in 1977.

Polanski won a Best Director Oscar for his 2002 Holocaust drama "The Pianist," but did not return to the U.S. to attend the awards ceremony.

The filmmaker directed such classics as "Rosemary's Baby," "The Fearless Vampire Killers" and "Chinatown" prior to fleeing the U.S.

Since then, he's directed several films outside of the U.S. starring American actors, including "Frantic" with Harrison Ford, "Death and the Maiden" with Sigourney Weaver and "The Ninth Gate" with Johnny Depp.