Zbigniew Ziobro, the Minister of Justice, was given the green light on new regulations on preventive confiscation being prepared; employers’ organizations believe that they are in conflict with the constitutional right to property, writes Monday’s Gazeta Wyborcza.
Horror at Czerska Street
The daily reminds that the project of the Ministry of Justice has been popular for several months, but so far there has been no consent to implement it at Nowogrodzka Street.
However, the elections have already taken place and according to our information, Ziobro has been given the green light to introduce changes
– writes “GW”.
According to the journal, the project is to be entered into the list of works of the Council of Ministers immediately after the summer holidays. According to entrepreneurs, the so-called preventive confiscation, in addition to “extended confiscation”, is a presumption of guilt.
According to “GW”, the project assumes that the state will be able to seize property – houses, money, cars, jewelry, etc. – which in the last five years was in the possession of a suspect or accused of acting in an organized criminal group.
The biggest controversy, however, is that it does not matter who currently owns the property that once belonged to the suspect
The newspaper wrote.
This property, regardless of who it currently belongs to, may be transferred to the State Treasury as a result of a court judgment.
Therefore, property may be lost by persons against whom no criminal proceedings are pending. Moreover, in order to seize their property, law enforcement agencies will not have to prove that the property was derived from a crime. The draft of the ministry states that it is the citizen himself who has to prove that he had acquired the property legally
– Gazeta reported in the Monday edition.
Appeal of the Entrepreneurship Council
Thus, law enforcement agencies will no longer have to prove the transfer of property or that it was used to commit crimes or was acquired illegally. This means the de facto introduction of a presumption of guilt!
– the Entrepreneurship Council, which gathered the largest Polish employers’ organizations (Konfederacja Lewiatan, ABSL, Federation of Polish Entrepreneurs, KIG, Polish Business Council, Employers of Poland, the Polish Bank Association, BCC and the Polish Craft Association), alarmed in an appeal issued in May, “the newspaper reports.
Confiscation of property and the actions of the prosecutor’s office against it are contrary to the constitutional right to property. This is unacceptable in a democratic state ruled by law – continues the Entrepreneurship Council, quoted by “GW”.
gah / PAP
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