Within the frames of the program “Better Justice System” the report was prepared by Michal Jagielski and Marek Nieduzak, working under supervision of Dr Adam Bodnar. The report examines legal and factual reality concerning public access to court judgments. It briefly describes solutions implemented in other countries, like the U.S., Germany or the Russian Federation and formulates recommendations for Poland.
Russian example is found to be particularly interesting – a special act was passed in this country that obliged courts to publish information regarding legal decisions. The act allows citizens to request information on functioning of judiciary and establishes openness as a rule in the Russian legal system.
As far as the situation in Poland is concerned, Polish Constitutional Tribunal and administrative courts do publish all their verdicts and orders (after anonymization) in the internet. Access to those judicial decisions is free and relatively easy. Citizens obtain information on how these courts understand and shape their rights and duties.
However, only selected judgments of the Polish Supreme Court and only very little of the common courts are published and available to any interested person. This state of affairs is not satisfactory, especially when it comes to the Supreme Court, whose judgments have great importance in the Polish legal system.
The authors believe that no real social control over the judicial power is possible, when there is no effective system of getting to know judicial decisions. Therefore they recommend, in the long run, full publication (after anonymization) of all verdicts and orders in the internet and in the short run, above all, full publication (after anonymization) of all the judicial decisions of the Supreme Court in the internet.
Marek Nieduzak
marek.nieduzak@adwokatura.pl
The report is available at: http://www.for.org.pl/upload/Nowy_Wymiar_Sprawiedliwosci/Raport_Publiczna_dostepnosc_orzeczen_sadowych.pdf
