“Being tried by a court not established in accordance with the law constitutes a clear violation of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights,” reminded prosecutor Piotr Turek. He also asked his colleagues on platform X what they would do when, based on a “regulation blatantly inconsistent with the law,” judges are selected for a given case.
In recent days, Niezalezna.pl reported on the regulation issued by Minister of Justice Waldemar Żurek, which eliminates the random assignment of judges to cases and allows for the random selection of only one judge, with the other two to be appointed manually. President Karol Nawrocki also commented on the matter, reminding Żurek that introducing such changes through a regulation is “an ostentatious act of lawlessness.“
“The attempt to replace statutes with a regulation undermines the constitutional order and the democratic legitimacy of the legislative branch. The proposed rules for determining the composition of the court are meant to become unverifiable in order to enable manual control over the selection of judges to meet the political needs and expectations of those in power,” wrote President Nawrocki on social media.
Another noteworthy voice, this time from the prosecutorial community, came from well-known prosecutor Piotr Turek, who addressed his colleagues on X with a question that, as he put it, they will soon be unable to avoid.
“We will not be able to avoid the question of how we should behave in the courtroom when we are faced with a panel selected on the basis of a regulation blatantly inconsistent with the law. We must also be prepared for the fact that the Minister of Justice who issued this regulation, acting as Prosecutor General, may issue us guidelines and orders in this regard. It has already happened before,” wrote Turek, asking, “what will we do then?”
“Especially if we are aware that in the palace on Postępu Street there will always be current or aspiring courtiers who will accept everything without batting an eye,” he added, referring to employees of the National Prosecutor’s Office.
Prosecutor Turek also pointed out a significant consequence of this situation – namely, that Poland risks having to pay compensation for judgments issued by courts not established in accordance with the law.
Since it has become fashionable to invoke Strasbourg and the amounts awarded by its tribunal, we should be aware that being tried by a court not established in accordance with the law is also an obvious violation of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. So in this case, too, Poland will bear the costs of legal voluntarism. That’s all for Sunday, concluded Piotr Turek.