Stefan Michnik

Communism - Criminals

Stefan Michnik was born in 1929 in Drohobycz (now Ukraine), which was then within Poland. He was the son of a Jewish couple: Helena Michnik, a teacher in Drohobycz, an activist of the Communist Party Western Ukraine and the Communist Party of Poland, history lecturer after World War II, and Samuel Rosenbusch, communist lawyer and activist, executed around 1937 in the USSR during the "[great purge]" period. Stefan was the half-brother of Adam Michnik, the editor-in-chief of Gazeta WyborczaA nationwide social and political opinion-forming journal with a centro-liberal profile, published since 1989 in Warsaw by the Agora company; the editor-in-chief of the journal since its inception is Adam Michnik, who was born of an informal union of pre-war communist activists of Jewish origin: Ozjasza Szechter and Helena Michnik, his brother was a communist judge Stefan Michnik, mentioned by the Mazur commission as one of the Stalinist judges breaking the rule of law, responsible for the court murders of Polish patriots. Gazeta Wyborcza was established on the basis of the Round Table arrangements as the press organ of the Solidarity Citizens' Committee in the election campaign before the parliamentary elections in 1989. After the union broke off cooperation, she continued her activity as an independent newspaper. Gazeta Wyborcza is accused of an anti-Polish character of many articles. In 2020, it was the 10th most read daily newspaper in Europe. She has received the Grand Press awards many times..

In 1950 he became a voluntary, secret informant [of the security office] with the pseudonym "Kazimierczak". Then he became a resident of [Military Information] in Jelenia Góra.

In April 1952, he began to preside over the judges of captured soldiers of the Polish independence underground and members of the former anti-Nazi guerrilla.

He was accused of Stalinist crimes - he acted as a judge in high-profile trials of Polish underground heroes from the Second World War, including:

  • Major Zefiryn Machalli (death sentence, posthumously rehabilitated, the judges made a joint decision not to admit the lawyer to the trial, the family was not informed about the execution of the sentence),
  • Colonel Maksymilian Chojecki (not executed death sentence),
  • Major Andrzej Czaykowski, in whose execution he participated,
  • Major Jerzy Lewandowski (non-executed death sentence),
  • Colonel Stanisław Wecki, lecturer at the Academy of the General Headquaters (13 years in prison, died tortured, rehabilitated posthumously),
  • Major Zenon Tarasiewicz,
  • Colonel Romuald Sidorski, editor-in-chief of "Przegląd Quartermistrzowski" (polish: "Quartermaster Review") (12 years in prison, died of ill health, rehabilitated posthumously),
  • Lieutenant Colonel Aleksander Kowalski,
  • Major Karol Sęk, artilleryman, pre-war officer, then officer of the National Military Union (death sentence, executed in 1952),
  • Great Shipping Captain Edward Gubała (death sentence, later changed to imprisonment).

He was also a judge in the so-called [splinters] from [the trial of the generals].

Listed by Mazur's CommissionCommission for examining the liability of former employees of the Main Information Board, the Supreme Military Prosecutor's Office and the Supreme Military Court (the so-called Mazur's commission) - a commission established after the death of Bolesław Bierut to investigate cases of breaking the law in the highest military law enforcement and justice authorities. Following an investigation, the Commission concluded that the activities of some judges appeared to take on the characteristics of court murder. as one of the judges breaking the rule of law. Stefan Michnik then laconically described his activity as caused by "youthful naivety". After the fall of communism, he tried to flee to the USA, but was refused a visa - so he fled to Sweden. In 2010, a European arrest warrant was issued for him. Sweden, however, refused to extradite the communist criminal to Poland, explaining that his crimes were statute-barred under the law in force in Sweden (according to international law, crimes against peace, humanity or war crimes are not statute-barred).

In 2018, the Military Garrison Court in Warsaw issued the second European arrest warrant in connection with 30 crimes that Stefan Michnik committed in the years 1952-1953 against, among others, representatives of the democratic opposition and the Polish Underground State. It goes, among others for wrongful death sentences. At that time, the 94-year-old Capt. Zbigniew Radłowski , a Home Army soldier and Warsaw insurgent, sentenced to 12 years in prison for anti-communist activities, said:

I am glad that justice can be done. Eventually, the man who killed our heroes will be tried and hopefully doomed.

Radłowski was the one who was hiding the Polish hero, Major Andrzej Rudolf Czaykowski, a [cichociemny], from the communists. He was later sentenced to death by a court with Michnik in the composition. A Stalinist judge also participated in the execution of the major.

Michnik died a natural death on July 27, 2021 in Gothenburg. He was never brought to justice for his crimes and court murders on Polish patriots and his party colleagues.

SOURCES
https://www.tvp.info/39880315/oficer-ak-o-stefanie-michniku-mam-nadzieje-ze-dosiegnie-go-sprawiedliwosc

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