GENERAL DIRECTIVES OF JUDICIAL SENTENCING FOR A CRIMINAL OFFENCE FOLLOWING THEIR LATEST REVISION

Abstract

The provision of Article 53(1) of the Polish Criminal Code sets out directives that guide the court in deciding on the severity of the penalty in each individual act of sentencing. These directives are referred to as “general directives of judicial sentencing”. Four such directives are generally derived from this provision: the directive of the degree of culpability, the directive of the degree of social harm, the directive of individual (specific) prevention and the directive of general positive prevention. The amending act of 7 July 2022 introduced new wording to Article 53(1) of the Criminal Code. Changes were also made to Article 85a of the Criminal Code, which sets out general directives of judicial sentencing in the case of aggregate penalties. The author takes a critical look at the changes introduced in the respective provisions. The aim of this examination is to determine the extent to which the content of the general directives of judicial sentencing, as defined in the amending act of 7 July 2022, differs from their previous formulation, and to what extent the introduced amendments can be considered justified.