Special Services

Officers of the CBA Regional Office in Rzeszów have detained two entrepreneurs residing in the Mazowieckie and Zachodniopomorskie Voivodships. In the Silesian Field Division of the Department for Organized Crime and Corruption of the National Prosecutor's Office, the men were charged with influence peddling. The prosecutor applied non-custodial preventive measures against them, including a bail, a ban on leaving the country, police supervision, and a ban on contact with other suspects.

Findings made in the course of the proceedings indicate that the suspects invoked influence in public institutions, i.e. in the municipal office and the circuit court. In exchange for financial advantage of PLN 100,000, they undertook to unlawfully arrange matters such as exemption from the obligation to pay property tax and the leasing by a receiver of a production facility of a bankrupt confectionery cooperative.

Along with the detentions, searches of the suspects' places of residence were carried out to secure evidence and financial means.

The operations are another stage of the multithreaded proceedings concerning the activities of an organised crime group involved in committing corruption offences. They involved invoking influence in state institutions and national organisational units disposing of public funds in Warsaw and other locations throughout the country. The offences were committed in the years 2019 - 2020. Furthermore, the group members acted as intermediaries in arranging matters in exchange for financial gains.

In 2020 alone, the persons involved in the criminal group accepted financial advantages of over PLN 4 million in return for taking on matters in law enforcement agencies, ministries, central offices, courts, customs and tax authorities, and companies with Treasury shareholding.

Currently, there are over 20 suspects involved in the case, who were presented with dozens of charges of committing offences of influence peddling, illegal possession of weapons, drug trafficking and participation in criminal activities of an organised crime group. The court decided to remand 15 of them in custody.

Source: CBA