The First President of the Supreme Court, Prof. Małgorzata Manowska, is not backing down in the controversial case concerning the discontinuation of an investigation into the killing of an unborn child at a hospital in Oleśnica. After the prosecutor’s office refused to accept her complaint, Prof. Manowska appealed that decision in its entirety to the court. She explicitly described the prosecutor’s position as “unfounded.”
After the District Prosecutor’s Office in Oleśnica refused to accept the complaint filed by the First President of the Supreme Court—deeming her an “unauthorized person”—Prof. Małgorzata Manowska took further legal steps.
As reported by the Supreme Court’s spokesperson, Judge Igor Zgoliński, the First President of the Supreme Court has challenged in court the prosecutor’s order refusing to accept her complaint.
“The prosecutor’s position, in the view of the authority lodging the appeal, is unfounded,” the spokesperson emphasized.
To recall, the case concerns an investigation that was discontinued on December 10.
At that time, the prosecutor’s office concluded that the procedure resulting in the death of an almost nine-month-old child, carried out in the 36th week of the mother’s pregnancy at a hospital in Oleśnica, did not bear the “hallmarks of a prohibited act.” In mid-December, the First President of the Supreme Court filed a complaint against this shocking decision.
However, the Oleśnica prosecutor’s office refused to accept Prof. Manowska’s submission. Investigators argued that while anyone may file a notification of a suspected crime, the right to challenge a decision to discontinue an investigation is limited. In the prosecutor’s assessment, for a state institution to lodge such a complaint, the case must be directly related to its activities or concern an offense revealed in the course of performing its duties.
Prof. Małgorzata Manowska takes a completely different view. In filing her complaint, she relied on a provision of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Article 306 §1a(2)), which, in her view, grants her full authority to act as a representative of a state institution that filed a notification of a crime. And it should be emphasized that Prof. Manowska, as the First President of the Supreme Court, did indeed submit such a notification in this case.
The prosecutor’s decision to refuse acceptance of the complaint is not final. This means that it will now ultimately be for the court to decide whether the First President of the Supreme Court had the right to challenge the prosecutor’s decision to discontinue the high-profile investigation.