APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200070029-7
contrast to the 5-year prison term permitted under former legislation. Moreover, the code of criminal procedure, otherwise virtually identical in content to the welter of procedural regulations and decrees which it replaces, contains a significant addition relating to secret trials. Thus, Article 308 of the code states that a court may order a trial to be held in camera "if in its view an open hearing would be likely to corrupt good manners, cause public disorder, or make revelations which for reasons of state security or other important public interests should remain secret." Although in practice the regime has always been able to conduct secret trials at its own choosing, this specific provision - including the operative criterion of "important public interests" - had never been a part of the formal body of procedural law.
The 1970 Polish criminal code and code of criminal procedure thus constitute relatively severe legislation that in many instances contradicts the so-called bill of rights embodied in the constitution of 1952. Its importance is both legal and political. In the less important legal sense, the unified legislation appears to close those loopholes which in practice sometimes enabled defense attorneys to obfuscate the prosecution's case by technical references to the mass of often contradictory provisions in the formerly disparate legislation. Politically, the new codes accurately reflect the repressive mood of the Gomulka regime in its last years, but they also reflect the strong disciplinary elements in the party which in fact opposed Gomulka for other reasons and and which later supported Gierek. This flexibility of the 1970 codes, the general if sometimes qualified support of this legislation by various political elements, and Gierek's own penchant for discipline all suggest that the Gierek regime will not seek rapid changes in the existing legislation, but rather will use its flexible features in the characteristic pragmatic manner.
(3) Prison systems - The characteristics and modes of operation of the Polish prison system during the postwar period have reflected the fluctuations in the country's political atmosphere more obviously and have had a deeper impact on the individual citizen than those of other sectors of the governmental apparatus. The prewar system, under the Ministry of Justice, approached model lines, making use of convict labor for correctional purposes only. From the end of World War II until the beginning of the post-Stalin "thaw" in 1954 the system was increasingly punitive, brutal, and overcrowded. The entire system, until 1954 under the feared Ministry of Public Security, made extensive and admitted use of forced labor camps, and, although they were never as severe as those in the Soviet Union, during one of their peak periods of occupancy, in 1949-1950, these camps contained an estimated 200,000 forced laborers.
One result of the 1954 reorganization of the security apparatus in Poland was the abolition of the Ministry of Public Security and the consequent transfer of the Prison Service to the newly created Ministry of Internal Affairs in December of that year. This transfer marked the beginning of fairly rapid improvements in the administration of the prison system, culminating in its full reorganization in the fall of 1956. In September of that year the Prison Service was placed under the traditional jurisdiction of the Ministry of Justice; in subsequent months brutal prison personnel were purged, and the majority of political prisoners were released in a succession of amnesties. The most important facet of the reforms, however, became the abolition of the forced labor camps, which were declared to be fully out of existence by mid-1957. Because the only judicial body empowered during the early 1950s to impose sentences of up to 2 years in forced labor camps ceased functioning in mid-1955, this official claim was probably true. Since 1957 convict labor has not been used except within prison workshops and under the provisions of compulsory vocational rehabilitation.
Basically, there are three types of correctional institutions, all under the administration of the Ministry of Justice in coordination with the office of the Prosecutor General: 1) major prisons for convicts serving long sentences for serious crimes; 2) jails or detention centers for less serious offenders or those being held for pre-trial detention; and 3) correctional institutions for juveniles. The ministry also operates directly - or supervises their operation by trade unions - a number of juvenile "shelters" which are in the nature of reform schools with vocational training. No official data on the number of institutions with the first two of the above categories are available. It is estimated, however, that in 1970 there were at least 26 major prisons and over 100 major detention centers in the country; together these institutions housed an officially admitted number of 70,943 adult convicts or temporary detainees. In addition, there were approximately 75 correctional and rehabilitation institutions of various kinds for juveniles, with about 6,000 juvenile inmates.
Since the mid-1960s the regime has increasingly stressed the functions of the prison system in the areas of rehabilitation, vocational training, and even academic schooling. Although some of this probably is propaganda, it also reflects true efforts to relieve the overburdened court system and the prisons of adult
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200070029-7
