The present work discusses the problems associated with the limiting of the rights of a temporarily arrested person in the light of the regulation of the minister of justice issued on 22 December 2016. In the statutory act of law, i.e. the provision Art. 217 c §2 kkw, the legislator regulated the substantive limitations associated with the use of a phone by the person who was temporarily arrested. However, the solutions contained in the regulation of the minister of justice which was instituted, and more specifically §25 of this document, introduce substantive limitations. As a consequence, a situation is brought
about in which the rights of an individual are limited in a lower-order legal act, which infringes the constitutional values of a state of law. Moreover, the article presents an interpretation of the provisions Art. 217 §2 kkw and §317 of the regulations of the minister of justice issued on 23 December 2015 – The rules and regulations of the operation of the courts of law and §190 of the regulations of the minister of justice issued on 7 April 2016 – The rules and regulations of the internal operation of the common organisational units of the public prosecution service.

The principle of subsidiarity of criminal law requires the location of the norms which regulate specific social relations beyond the branch of law which was adduced. On the one hand, it enables the realisation of the postulate, peculiar to the system of repressive law, to place the rules of conduct and the norms which regulate specific relations beyond criminal law. On the one hand, the intervention with criminalisation into relations regulated by other branches of law should enforce a significant synchronisation of the regulations of criminal law with the norms which are peculiar to a given branch of law. A legal system which features co-relations should represent consistency. As a result, the criminalisation of behaviour regulated by other branches of law deepens the connotations between them. The enracinement of legal regulations into an increasing number of new areas is the source of doubts associated with the lack of consistency between the particular regulations or, in the case of a strong drive of the criminal law to inscribe itself into legal norms which regulate a given sphere of life, to the negation of the capability of the criminal law to acquire functions which are set to this branch of law. On the basis of selected examples, the article attempts to reflect upon the legislator’s maintenance of the balance between these values.

The purpose of the article is to draw attention to the fact that the Polish legal system features system-related guarantees of the rights of the detainee which are regulated in a multi-centric system of law, consisting of a set of constitutional norms and legal international norms, which create the models of judicial control of detention in a Polish criminal lawsuit. The article puts forward a thesis that the Polish system features the socalled dispersed control of constitutionality, which is erroneously considered a synonym of the concept of the so-called direct application of the constitution. The questions under discussion are analysed by means of a formal-dogmatic method. The article also discusses the possibility of the participation of assistant judges in the exercise of judicial control of detention, with reference to the recent modification of the system-based position of assistant judges.

The problems of the so-called poisonous tree in the course of the preliminary legal proceedings appear and continue to appear basically in every individual instance of the evaluation of the body of evidence submitted to the public prosecutor’s department. The task of the public prosecutor’s department has to do inter alia with the keeping of law and order and the supervision of the prosecution of crime. This task is realised by the supervision of the consistency of the preliminary legal proceedings with the law, and the initialisation and the performance of operational-examination activities by law enforcement organs in the scope of activities which is stipulated in the acts of law which regulate the organisation and the object of activities of these organs. The supervision which was indicated should be realised in an in-depth, comprehensive and substantive manner. Within the framework of the evaluation of the activities engaged by other organs, inluding those that are authorised to execute and conduct operation-related activities, the public prosecutor is obliged to evaluate the correctness of the process of the accumulation of evidence and the making of decisions in terms of the scope and the means of utilising the said evidence. Such control may and should be conducted with reference to the constitutional principles, described particularly in Art. 2 – the principle of a democratic state of law, Art. 7 – the principle of legalism, Art. 45 Par. 1 – the principle of the right to a trial and the resulting principle of the right to due process. The regulations of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland have not been modified since 1997, therefore with the changed state of the regulations of the Code of Criminal Law (the addition of new regulations in Art. 168 a and b ) or the competence-related acts of law, it is still possible to interpret these regulation in terms of the constitutional norms which were indicated. The new content which was introduced to the code of criminal procedure is a source of serious constitution-related doubts, and the evaluation of the material which was submitted to be treated during criminal proceedings may lead to statements that the very fact of having acquired a piece of evidence with the violation of regulations or by means of a criminal offense and the simultaneous violation of the regulations of the Constitutions is sufficient to preclude the utilisation of a given piece of evidence in these legal proceedings and to preclude the establishment of the actual state of affairs on the basis of such a piece of evidence. It is impossible to accept a situation in which the functionaries of the state, i.e. of public authorities, can collect evidence-related material in violation of the law which is binding and it is in keeping with the law that, on the basis of this material, citizens may
bear criminal responsibility.

The article discusses the problem of the appointment of the adjudicating panel in criminal cases. The currently binding Code of criminal procedure introduced relevant regulations in reference to this question in Art. 351, which stipulates the following: § 1A judge or judges called on to hear the case shall be designated in line with the sequence of the cases submitted, from a roll of judges of the given court or department, known to the parties. Deviation from this rule is only allowed in the event of a judge’s illness or other important obstacle, which should be noted in the order designating the date of hearing. § 2 When an indictment includes a charge for a crime carrying a penalty of 25 years of deprivation of liberty or a life imprisonment, designation of the panel to hear the case shall, on a motion from the defence counsel or state prosecutor, be carried out by drawing lots at which they shall have a right to be present. The state prosecutor may bring the motion not later than within 7 days after the submission of the indictment, and a defence counsel, within 7 days from when the indictment was served on him. § 3 constitutes act-of-law delegation for the minister of justice for the issuing of the regulation in order to determine the detailed principles of designating the panel to hear cases by drawing lots. Such a regulation was issued on 2 June 2003 r. (Dz.U. of 2003, No 107, item no. 1007). The regulation which was quoted was developed with article 1 point 81 of the act of law issued on 11 March 2016 about the change of the act of law – the Code of the criminal procedure and some other acts of law (Dz. U. of 2016, Item no. 437), but in reality it did not come into force at all, for it was derogated with Article 4 point 1 of the act of law issued on 12 July 2017 about the change of the act of law – The law on the system of common courts and some other acts of law (Dz. U. of 2017, Item no. 1452). On the basis of Art. 41 Par. 1 of the act of law issued on 27 July 2001 – The law on the system of common courts in reference to Art. 20 of the aforementioned act of law issued on 12 July 2017 which amended the law on the system of common courts. The Minister of Justice, by issuing a regulation on 28 December 2017, changed the theretofore binding rules and regulations concerning the operation of common courts (Dz. U. of 2017, Item no. 2481) and determined therein the comprehensive rules as to the allocation of cases to the particular judges by drawing lots, the classification of cases into the particular categories and the principles of the establishment of multi-person panels.

The work is devoted to the non-statutory justification of action in the scope of the right to defence, whose purpose was the exclusion of criminal responsibility for giving false testimony by a witness – the actual perpetrator – in his or her case. It was emphasised that the defence which heretofore resulted from Art. 182 and 183 kk was insufficient for the witness. One discussed inter alia the legal basis of the justification, its constituent elements, one indicated the  controversies which were caused by the concept of justification, and which to a great extent were associated with the violation, by the Supreme Court, of
the constitutional principle of the tripartite division of powers and with the substantive and temporal limits of the right to defence which result both from the norms of international and domestic law. One indicated the position of the representatives of the doctrine as to the concept of justification. Scholarship on the subject, even though it did not take a uniform stand in reference to the problem in question, basically discerned the necessity of the improvement of the situation of the witness – the actual perpetrator, who, testifying in his or her own case, would run the risk of self-incrimination. The considerations of the doctrine resulted in numerous alternative propositions de lege ferenda. In the work, one suggests to seek such a solution in the substantive approach to the nemo se ipsum accusare tenetur rule. Then it was emphasised that the problem of justification once again became the subject of discussion owing to the amendment issued on 11 March 2016 about the modification of the act of law – The Code of Criminal Procedure and certain other acts of law Art. 233 §1a kk. At that time one penalised the behaviour of a witness, who in fear of criminal liability to be faced by the witness or his relatives gives false testimony or conceals the truth. For the sake of recapitulation, one indicated that the amendment which was described above rendered the justification in question invalid, and the perpetrator who is heard in a court of law as a witness continues de lege lata to be entitled to use the right to refuse to answer the question from Art. 183 §1 kpk. One emphasised that the doctrine recurrently discerned the shortcomings of defence which result from Art. 183 §1 kpk. Above all the institution from Art. 183 §1 kpk was not intended for a witness – the actual perpetrator. Therefore, in the article, in order to realise the warranty nature of the entitlement in question one suggests that this admonishment should be rendered obligatory, so that every witness would be aware that the right exists and that he or she may exercise it.

The principle of legalism places upon the public prosecutor the obligation o pressing charges to a court of law and then to support this claim in the course of the lawsuit. It seems obvious that in order to execute this duty in an appropriate manner, the public prosecutor should attend the trial and actively participate in it. However, in regulation Art. 46 §2 k.p.k., which was introduced by way of an amendment issued on 11 March 2016, the legislator stipulated a regulation which permits the public prosecutor not to appear during the trial, if the preliminary legal proceedings concluded in the form of investigation. Obviously, the task of this regulation is to accelerate the proceedings in cases of lesser calibre, which are cases in which an investigation is conducted. However, it is necessary to consider the aforementioned regulation in the context of the basic principles of a criminal lawsuit and the analysis of the consequences of such regulations. Therefore, in the first instance one made reference to the most important regulations contained in the basis acts of international law, i.e. the European Convention of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which emphasise above all the significance of independence and impartiality, as well as the principle of a quick and efficient operation of the procedure. It was also necessary to refer the substantive regulation to the principle of the contradictoriness of the criminal lawsuit, which stipulates inter alia the separation of lawsuit-related roles and the passivity of the court in reference to the initiative of the parties who argue their cases.

By means of an act of law issued on 23 March 2017 in order to “reinforce the realisation of the obligation of guardianship by satisfying the material necessities of people who are unable to satisfy them on their own”, one introduced changes in the heretofore binding regulation which stipulated criminal responsibility for evading the obligation of the payment of alimony (Art. 209 k.k.). The regulation which was mentioned received new content, inter alia by introducing a qualified type, and it was furnished – for the first time in the history of the criminalisation on the non-payment of alimony – in a clause of impunity and the clause about the refraining from administering punishment in the case of the manifestation of voluntary disclosure on the part of the offender after the commission of the crime of the non-payment of alimony. The present publication explores the problems associated with the latter point – voluntary disclosure. In the light of the analysis which was conducted and the legislative deficiencies of the regulation Art. 209 § 5 k.k. and its relation to regulation Art. 59 k.k. one stated that from the perspective of legislative technique § 5 is inappropriate, and from the perspective of the criminal policy it is redundant. It seems that the function which is assumed – the ensuring of the satisfaction of the claims of the aggrieved party –simply regulation § 4 Art. 209 k.k., would serve this task perfectly, obviously after the removal of the shortcomings which were indicated.

From the perspective of legal-international and constitutional guarantees of a two-instance procedure one should consider admissible the exclusion of the control of the actual basis in reference to guilt and punishment when such an adjudication constituted the object of a lawsuit-related contract, for the right to instance-based control of adjudications is relinquishable, and the limitations of the challengeability of contractual rulings was regulated in the Polish criminal procedure as not to exclude the right of the parties to bring about control of contractual rulings in a general manner, but only to constrain the catalogue of the admissible appeal-based accusations. However, the complete liquidation of the instance-based control of the establishment of the actual state of affairs
contradicts the legal-international and constitutional guarantees, for the reconstruction of the actual state of affairs constitutes a component of the adjudication about someone’s culpability in the trial-related sense, and the control of the solution of this problem is guaranteed at the international level. The abolishment of instance-based control of the establishment of the actual state of affairs, being a manifestation of the pursuit of praxeological economical arrangements, also results in the reduction of the probability of reaching material truth. Moreover, it changes the model of a multi-faceted verification based activities realised within the framework of a typical instance-based course into control which is similar to an analysis and correction peculiar to the extraordinary modes of control-related proceedings.

The changes in the broadly conceived criminal procedure which were introduced in recent years refer to the problems which are crucial from the perspective of the protection of human rights, such as the scope of the authority of the services due to operational control which is conducted secretly, the model of the functioning of the public prosecution service or the unlawful acquiring of evidence in a criminal procedure. The evaluation of these changes, conducted by the Ombudsman from the point of view of the constitutional standards of the protection of the rights of the individual is not positive. The new regulations reduce the quality of these standards and they do not contain sufficient guarantees of protection against the arbitrariness of the activities engaged in these
terms by the organs of public authority. This phenomenon imposes a particular duty on the courts – which hear criminal cases – to see that the final decision in a criminal case respects the universal standards of the protection of human rights.

The institution of provocation in criminal law is an extremely interesting phenomenon, for it may refer both to people who do not perform any public functions as well as to people who hold such a position. In this perspective, it was necessary to indicate in the article the origin of the word provocation and its etymology. Therefore, one conducted an analysis of various definitions and their components. One also indicated the origin of the eponymous institution and the examples manifested in international body of rulings. In a description of such phenomena as provocation, it is necessary to indicate the responsibility of the person who commits the offence(s) mentioned in Art. 24 of the Penal Code. An interesting element has to do with the indication – in one of the subchapters – of the utilisation of provocation in operation- and situation assessment-related activities, which are a result of the act of law about the Police and about other services. Finally, one should ask oneself the question about the extent to which one may shift the application of regulations about responsibility, considering the catalogue of institutions which may employ such technique(s)? Therefore, should not one delimit the scope of the competence of organs such as the Public Prosecutor General/Minister of Justice, in order to enhance the efficiency of the system which was mentioned above? The conclusion of the article constitutes an attempt at answering the question about the aforementioned questions and to consider the plausibility of the combining these positions in the context of the subject which is discussed.

The principle of openness, as one of the foremost principles of criminal proceedings, is realised above all during the main trial. The amendment act of law to the code of criminal procedure issued on 10 June 2016 introduced model changes in this regard. The article is devoted to a discussion of mainly these changes in the context of their consistency with the Constitution. The first change has to do with the fact that the public prosecutor has the right to express his or her objection toward the holding of a trial in camera, while such an objection is binding for the court. This regulation is a source of reservations of constitutional nature, for it violates the constitutional right to a fair adjudication of a case by the court. The second fundamental change consists in the establishment, as
a principle, of audio-visual registering of the court session by the representatives of media outlets. In these terms, a critical analysis should be conducted upon the removal of the condition of the respect of the important interest of the participant of a criminal proceeding. However, a basically positive evaluation was received by the extension of the scope of the openness of the main trial, expressing a thesis about the constancy of this regulation with the Constitution.

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