This is how service weapons should be used. The case of the change was the case of Igor Stachowiak

The website of the National Prosecutor's Office includes guidelines of the Prosecutor General on conducting preparatory proceedings in the field of events using direct coercion measures and firearms by officers performing official activities.

As written in a message posted on the PK website, “Prosecutor General Adam Bodnar (…) issued on July 22, 2025, guidelines on conducting preparatory proceedings in connection with events including deprivation of life, causing severe damage to health or occurring in circumstances indicating the degrading or punishment, which occurred during the implementation of service activities by officers entitled to use and use direct coercion measures and firearms. “

It was noted that the Prosecutor General decided that “it is necessary to create system solutions regarding the work of prosecutors, guaranteeing a reliable and comprehensive explanation of such events, maintaining the highest professionalism and objectivity.”

As we read in the communiqué, “the purpose of the guidelines is to unify the practice of conducting proceedings in the field of events in which the officers were used and the use of direct coercion measures and firearms” while maintaining the standards specified in art. 2 and 3 of the European Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

It was indicated that the content of the guidelines takes into account the postulates reported by the Igor Stachowiak Foundation (associating persons victims of the crime), consulted with the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, “and the findings resulting from the files of numerous proceedings conducted in the organizational units of the prosecutor's office across the country regarding such events.”

It was noted that due to the fact that “proceedings related to the use of direct coercion measures and firearms by authorized officers belong to particularly difficult and complicated,” the guidelines adopted solutions introducing strict supervision over such matters.

At the same time, it was noted that they are also aimed at “meeting the expectations of victims of this type of crime, so that prosecutors with appropriate knowledge and competences, and taking all possible procedural actions aimed at clarifying all circumstances of events.”

It was also pointed out that the proceedings “should be conducted in the form of an own investigation by the prosecutor, in such a situation the entire burden of taking evidence rests with the prosecutor, who is obliged to perform them in person.”

It was stated that the proceedings covered by the scope of guidelines “will be subject to permanent monitoring in the department of the preparatory proceedings of the National Prosecutor's Office, which was obliged to develop annual reports on files of matters covered by the guidelines together with statistical data regarding their implementation.”

The guidelines come into force on the day they were signed. Thus, the guidelines of the Prosecutor General of June 27, 2014 are lost, reference number PG VII G 021/4/14, regarding prosecutors conducting proceedings for crimes related to deprivation of life and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the perpetrators of which are police officers or other public officials.

The content of the document can be downloaded from the National Prosecutor's Office. (PAP)

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