Criminal Trial System in Poland in the Period of ‘People’s Democracy’

Abstract

The paper depicts changes through which the Polish penal procedure had to go in the 40s and 50s of the 20th century, when the state was transforming into ‘people’s democracy’. Particular attention has been drawn to the fact that the earliest solutions in the penal procedure then implemented were of ‘ut of code’ character and effected mainly the proceedings before special courts. Hence the illusion that major procedural guarantees included in the penal code of 1928 still held could be maintained.
Relevant amendments of the penal code were only made in 1949 and 1950, but they were largely a transposition of these ‘ut of code’ acts that originally reflected the Soviet solutions into the Polish legal procedure. What should be emphasised though is the fact that some of the solutions then adopted have survived, intact or only slightly modified, and continue to function in Polish penal proceedings today.