NCJ Number
104071
Date Published
1986
Length
14 pages
Annotation
As a result of significant increases in virtually all categories of crime between 1979 and 1985, the Polish Parliament adopted a number of amendments to the Penal Code, and the Code of Criminal Procedure and enacted the 1985 Special Penal Liability law.
Abstract
This latter, enacted for an experimental 3-year period, calls for significant changes in Polish criminal justice policy. Under this law, conditional suspension of penalty is banned; minimum limits on fines for numerous offenses are raised; forfeiture is obligatory in many cases; grounds for revocation of conditional release have been expanded; and recidivists are excluded from conditional release. Other changes include the increased application of summary and expedited proceedings and the introduction of pretrial detention. These broad substantive and procedural changes, while spurred on by increasing crime rates and public demands for more severe sanctions and dissatisfaction with the perceived leniency of the courts, could have been achieved through changes in practice rather than through legislation. The current situation must be viewed as a social experiment in criminal justice policy. It will require evaluation not only in terms of its effectiveness as a crime control measure, but also in terms on its impact on prison overcrowding. 6 footnotes.