DISCIPLINARY COMMISSIONER

OF THE ORDINARY COURT JUDGES

Warsaw, dated 26 November 2019

COMMUNICATION of the Disciplinary Commissioner of the Ordinary Court Judges on the opening disciplinary proceedings with respect to Rafał L., Wojciech M. and Kazimierz W., Judges of the Regional Court in Kraków

I declare that I presented charges to Rafał L., Wojciech M. and Kazimierz W., Judges of the Regional Court in Kraków, on 25 November 2019 regarding disciplinary offences involving the breach of the dignity of the office by the fact that, on 6 September 2019, during an appeal hearing in Krakow, as public officials – members of the adjudicating panel – in the case of the Regional Court in Kraków of case reference IV Ka 194/19, they overstepped their powers, whereby they awarded themselves the right to assess the correctness of the operation of constitutional bodies regarding the appointment of a court assessor in the first instance at the District Court in Chrzanów, thereby breaching the provision of Article 106i § 1 of the Law on the System of Ordinary Courts of 27 July 2001 (Journal of Laws of 2019, item 52 as amended, hereinafter “SOC”), they took part in issuing a decision to defer a hearing in order to establish whether circumstances arise which could suggest the incorrect appointment of this assessor, which constituted illegal interference with the statutory procedure of appointing judges and court assessors to adjudicating panels, as specified in Article 46a § 1 and Article 47b § 1 SOC and could have led to a breach of the provision of Article 178, para. 1 of Constitution of the Republic of Poland and breached Article 89 § 1 SOC, thereby constituting an action to the detriment of the public interest expressed in the correct functioning of the justice administration, which exhausted the provision of Article 107 § 1 SOC.

(-) Regional Court Judge Piotr Schab

Disciplinary Commissioner

of the Ordinary Court Judges