President Andrzej Duda has applied the law of pardon to Mariusz Kaminski and Maciej Wąsik. Both legally convicted Law and Justice (PiS) politicians on Tuesday evening left the prisons in which they were serving two-year prison sentences.

Earlier, Justice Minister Adam Bodnar sent documents to the head of state regarding the pardon of the former ruling party politicians. The minister included a motion not to exercise the right of pardon.

On 20 December 2023, Kaminski and Wąsik were sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for failing to fulfil their duties and exceeding their powers. On 9 January, the police detained both politicians; they were later remanded to prison.

Kaminski and Wasik were convicted for their actions concerning the so-called ‘land scandal’. This was a provocation directed against Andrzej Lepper, then deputy prime minister in the government of Jarosław Kaczyński – the president of the Law and Justice party. At the time, Mariusz Kaminski was the head of the Central Anti-Corruption Bureau and Maciej Wąsik his deputy.

As the district court stated, Mariusz Kaminski “exceeded the powers granted to him and failed to fulfil his duties” in that he “directed the commission” of a criminal act by CBA officers subordinate to him “despite the lack of legal grounds”. The verdict speaks of planning, organising, and executing “with the use of CBA officers carrying out his instructions” a provocation.

With regard to Maciej Wąsik, the court found that he had failed to fulfil his duties in that “in carrying out the orders of his superior, i.e. the Head of the CBA Mariusz Kamiński, the fulfilment of which would result in the commission of a prohibited act, he failed to comply with the obligation under Article 71(2) of the cited Act on the CBA to refuse to carry out the order, and also exceeded his powers in that he ordered his subordinate employees to carry out operational and exploratory activities, despite the lack of legal grounds for their implementation”.

Arkadiusz Słomczyński