POLAND Law and Practice Contributed by: Jaroslaw Kruk, Joanna Bogdanska and Urszula Brzozowska, KW Kruk and Partners Law Firm
Limitation Period for Claims for Compensation The limitation periods for claims for damages pursued in civil proceedings are as follows: • three years from the date on which the injured party learnt about the damage and the person obliged to compensate for it, although this period may not be longer than ten years from the date on which the event causing the damage occurred; and • 20 years from the date on which the crime was committed if the damage resulted from a crime or a misdemeanour (in which case it is irrelevant whether criminal proceedings have previously been instituted and penalties imposed). 1.5 Proprietary Claims Against Property Rules Regarding the Procedure for the Recovery of Funds A basic principle that is of vital importance when a vic - tim claims restitution is the need to prove ownership of the funds that were lost as a result of the fraud. It is therefore necessary to submit to the Public Pros - ecutor’s Office any evidence and documents in one’s possession that will prove ownership of these funds. If the fraudulent funds are commingled with other funds in the offender’s accounts, recovery will be difficult but not impossible. As a matter of principle, Polish law does not use pro - prietary tracing concepts in the same way as some common law jurisdictions. In practice, the victim’s position will usually depend on whether the asset can still be identified with sufficient precision and whether ownership-based arguments remain available. This distinction may be particularly important in insolven - cy, because an ownership-based position is generally stronger than a purely personal claim for payment. Where there is only one victim and said victim proves ownership of the lost funds, recovery will be possi - ble. However, the situation becomes more compli - cated when there are many victims in the case and the funds blocked in the offender’s accounts are not sufficient to satisfy all the victims. In such cases, pros - ecutors sometimes apply a proportional division of the blocked funds depending on the amount of funds lost by each victim, but more often, due to the compli - cated nature of the case, the case is taken to court for
and abetting. Polish criminal law treats incitement and aiding and abetting on a par with perpetration, so the instigator or aider is punished within the limits of the threat intended for the perpetrators. Accepting Funds From Fraud – Money Laundering The acceptance of fraudulent assets may be qualified as a crime of money laundering. Liability on this basis may be borne by the person who: • receives, possesses, uses, transfers or exports abroad, hides, transfers or converts funds derived from crime; • assists in the transfer of ownership or possession; or • undertakes other activities that may frustrate or significantly hinder the determination of assets’ criminal origin or place of placement, detection, seizure or forfeiture. Civil Procedure The Civil Code provides a basis for filing a claim for redress of damage against a person who persuaded or helped another person to cause damage, as well as against a person who knowingly benefitted from the damage caused to another person. Civil law also provides for the possibility of filing an Actio Pauliana, which is used in a situation where a third party obtains a financial benefit as a result of a legal act performed by the debtor to the detriment of creditors; the credi - tor may then request that this act be recognised as ineffective in relation to said creditor. It is necessary, however, that the debtor acted with awareness of harming the creditors and that the third party also knew about it. 1.4 Limitation Periods Limitation Period in Criminal Law In criminal proceedings, the limitation period depends on how the act is classified and what penalty is imposed for a given crime. As a rule, in the case of fraud and money laundering (which are the most com - mon legal qualifications in this type of act), the per - petrator cannot be punished if 15 years have elapsed since the offence was committed, so the statute of limitations for punishing these types of offences is 15 years.
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