“Wasted time and ruined lives of many people, millions of zlotys for fabricated expert opinions and the destroyed PKP Cargo company, once a national champion,” wrote Jakub Karnowski, former president of PKP in 2012-15, on the X portal, referring to the court's decision to discontinue the ongoing eight years of proceedings regarding property damage to PKP Cargo.
The prosecutor's office withdrew the indictment regarding causing property damage to PKP Cargo. The defendants were 13 people – former members of the company's management board and supervisory board.
They were accused of causing large-scale property damage to the property of PKP Cargo in the total amount of not less than PLN 8.77 million and causing a direct threat of large-scale property damage in the amount of not less than PLN 1 million, in connection with the acquisition of 80 percent. shares of AWT BV.
As Syk-Jankowska reported, according to the indictment, the property damage was to be caused “through undue remuneration for advice on the acquisition of the indicated company and unjustified insurance of the transaction.”
“False reporting by a PiS nominee”
Jakub Karnowski, former chairman of the supervisory board of PKP Cargo and former president of PKP in 2012-15, commented on the decision to discontinue the proceedings on social media.
“After even a cursory analysis of the case files, court proceedings might turn out to be unnecessary. I will not comment on the actual reasons for conducting preparatory proceedings. I regret the fact that other than substantive considerations resulted in the State Treasury, i.e. all of us, incurring huge financial and social costs,” he ruled. The District Court in Warsaw, discontinuing on October 4, 2024, the case against me and 12 other members of the management board and supervisory board of PKP Cargo, initiated in 2016 after a false report by PiS nominee Maciej Libiszewski by Ziobro prosecutors and conducted mainly by suspended prosecutor Jerzy 'garaż' Ziarkiewicz and his adjutant Bartosz Wójcik from Lublin. 8 years and 4 months,” wrote the former president of PKP on the X website.
“Wasted time and ruined lives of many people, millions of zlotys spent on fabricated expert opinions and the destroyed PKP Cargo company, once a national champion,” he concluded.
Case against former PKP managers
The former president and members of the management board of PKP Cargo were detained in February 2019. The prosecutor's office informed that the investigation was initiated in 2016 on the basis of a notification from the new management board of PKP Cargo, based on expert opinions, and concerned the purchase by PKP Cargo of 80 percent. shares in Advanced World Transport BV based in Amsterdam, which carries out, among others, rail freight transport within the area Czech.
According to investigators, the value of the transaction made in December 2014 (amounting to over EUR 103 million) was overstated by more than half, and the damage in connection with this transaction was said to have amounted to a quarter of a billion zlotys.
The prosecutor's office reported that members of the management board of PKP Cargo decided to purchase a foreign company for this amount “despite the awareness of the high risk affecting the company's valuation, which was not taken into account when preparing it.” It was related to, among others, with the possibility of losing the main customer of the purchased company – the OKD mine in the Czech Republic, which was phasing out coal mining, and with the valuation of the purchased company containing numerous errors, including undervalued value of purchased rolling stock.
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