Tag: judicial independence

‘Judge Morawiec does not even have the status of a suspect, yet she is visited at dawn. We want to express our solidarity with Beata Morawiec, judge of the District Court in Kraków, who was not afraid to stand up to Minister Zbigniew Ziobro’ – says Jakub Kościerzyński, judge of the District Court in Bydgoszcz.

The public prosecutor, assisted by the Central Anti-Corruption Bureau (CAB), entered Judge Beata Morawiec’s house a little after 6 a.m. on 18 September. Threatening to search the house, he took her official laptop containing sensitive data. Judge Morawiec is the president of the Themis association of judges, which defends the courts and criticizes the Minister of Justice, Zbigniew Ziobro.

The rule of law in Poland and other member states is important not only for the citizens of these countries, but also for the future of the European project as a club of countries with high-quality democratic institutions safeguarding human rights – says Civil Development Forum (FOR)

Jarosław Kaczyński: “there is indeed a problem in Poland with the rule of law, but the main sources of this state of affairs are court judgments contra legem. It is our duty to ensure that these judgments made in conflict with the law are swiftly revoked and the judges who issue them held accountable on disciplinary charges and, consequently, removed from the profession.”

“The involvement of a judge, who speaks up on such public matters related to the rule of law is certainly not a political voice.” Prof. Marek Safjan, judge of the Court of Justice of the EU and retired judge of the Constitutional Tribunal, comments on the reports that the disciplinary commissioners want to prosecute 1,200 judges throughout Poland who signed the letter to the OSCE asking it to oversee the postal presidential elections, which were to be held in May 2020.

Judges from all over Poland are reporting themselves to the disciplinary commissioners. This is how they are supporting judges from Piotrków Trybunalski, who are being prosecuted for signing a letter to the OSCE, as well as the head of the largest association of judges in Poland, Krystian Markiewicz.

The Chamber of Labour has asked the CJEU to consider the status of the ‘new’ Supreme Court judges, as well as the bans on judges in the ‘muzzle’ act adopted by PiS. It has also requested the CJEU to consider its preliminary questions under an accelerated procedure

The day after the presidential election, you could hear announcements from the government camp that its national-Catholic revolution will be completed. In the first wave, there will be a reckoning with the free media, and the courts will have their final takeover. The government could also take control of schools and universities

In my opinion, each of the two points of the CJEU order is sufficient for the Disciplinary Chamber of the Supreme Court to stop all judicial activity with regard to judges, until the final judgment is delivered by the CJEU or until the safeguard order is amended, Adam Bodnar emphasizes.

A dozen or so judges from Piotrków Trybunalski and the surrounding area are under threat of disciplinary action for signing a letter to the OSCE. The local disciplinary commissioner who was promoted in court at the time of the PiS government is investigating them