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A journalist and the editor-in-chief of a local newspaper were proclaimed guilty of disclosing information on closed-door court proceedings. The guilty verdict was rendered despite the fact that it was the court itself who had allowed the journalists to access the records of the proceedings to write a newspaper article.

The procedure employed to amend the Public Information Act fell short of the constitutional requirements for the legislative process, held the Constitutional Tribunal last week, deciding the motion brought by Poland’s President.

The Circuit Court in Cracow found Prof. Legutko, a former conservative education minister, currently a member of the European Parliament, in breach of the personal interests of two Wrocław secondary school students. Mr Legutko had called them, among other things, “snots spoilt by their parents” and named their actions “a typical, infantile tantrum”.

According to the statement of the Appellate Prosecutor’s Office in Cracow received by the HFHR, in the course of the investigation involving the offence under article 231(1) of the Criminal Code (abuse of power) the prosecutors interviewed 62 persons and collected 20 volumes of evidence.

The Circuit Court in Rzeszów ruled that the Musa Dogan’s extradition to Turkey would be inadmissible, citing the risk of torture as one of the grounds for the decision.Musa Dogan is a Turkish Kurd. In 1996 he was sentenced to harsh life imprisonment by the State Security Court in Izmir.

The European Court of Human Rights delivered the judgement in the case of Kaperzyński versus Poland. The case concerned a conviction for the failure to publish a correction to a press article. The Court held unanimously that the criminal liability for the failure to publish a correction violated the freedom of speech.

The Polish Council for Foreigners decided to expel a homosexual from Uganda to his home country. The Council upheld a decision of the Head of the Office for Foreigners who refused to grant the foreigner a refugee status or other type of protection. The Ugandan came to Poland in August 2009 and applied for a refugee status. He claimed that in his country of origin he had been persecuted because of his sexual orientation

Supreme Court decided that hearings in criminal cases should be held in open court. This resolution, adopted in March by a seven-judge panel of the Court, resolved a long-lasting legal dispute concerning the possibility of the members of the public to attend criminal trials.

As a party invited to the public consultations, the HFHR presented before the Sejm and Senate committees a critical review of the draft amendment to the provisions on correction and response in the Press Act. The Foundation prepared a long list of reservations concerning the draft prepared by the Sejm and Senate committees.