Judges for Judges and Professor Laurent Pech have submitted joint third party interventions before the European Court of Human Rights in the cases of Polish judges Biliński and Juszczyszyn.

The case of Biliński v Poland primarily concerns the proceedings concerning the applicant’s forced transfer from the Criminal to the Family and Juvenile Division, which amounted to a disguised reprisal for his rulings and was unfair in many aspects.

The case of Juszczyszyn v Poland concerns the proceedings for and following the suspension of the applicant from his official duties by a body itself since suspended twice by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and whose lack of independence has also been definitively established by the ECJ as a matter of EU law.

In both cases, three main submissions are made:

1. The existence of worsening systemic and generalised deficiencies as regards the rule of law, including the unlawful nature of the multiple legislative changes made by Polish authorities, has been repeatedly and firmly established by both the European Commission and the European Parliament but also by the ECJ and national courts such as the Rechtbank Amsterdam and the Irish Supreme Court.
2. The existence of systemic and generalised deficiencies as regards the rule of law in Poland has revealed a now well-established pattern whereby Polish authorities and the courts they have captured or the new bodies they have created are actively colluding with the view of deliberately and systematically organising the violation of national but also ECJ and most recently European Court of Human Rights rulings they do not approve of.
3. Due to systemic and generalised deficiencies regarding the independence of the Polish judiciary and the pattern of sustained, deliberate and flagrantly unlawful targeting of independent judges, it is submitted that the right of access to an independent tribunal and the right to an effective remedy must be considered as being no longer guaranteed for any of the judges, prosecutors or lawyers who are or have been targeted by national authorities or the bodies they have unlawfully established (e.g. the Disciplinary Chamber) or re-established (e.g. the ‘new’ NCJ), due to multiple legislative changes which have enabled the executive to ‘interfere throughout the entire structure and output of the justice system’ while, simultaneously, national remedies ensuring effective legal protection have been removed or weakened across the board in order to prevent any judicial challenge aimed at these so-called ‘judicial reforms’.

Click here to download the full texts of the interventions in both cases:

• Biliński v Poland (application no. 13278/20)
• Juszczyszyn v Poland  (application no. 35599/20)

Photo: Adrian Grycuk