In 2022, Poland's homicide rate was 0.68 per 100,000, with a total of 270 murders committed.[1] The murder rate has remained relatively stable since 2014, when it was 0.74 per 100,000, with a total of 287 murders committed.[1] The highest recorded homicide rate in the modern history of Poland was 2.39 per 100,000 in 1994,[1] still during the democratic consolidation period following the 1989 fall of communism, which put an end to the Polish People's Republic and started the democratic transition.
According to UNODC data, the rape rate in Poland was 1.48 per 100,000 in 2022, down from 1.70 per 100,000 in 2015.[4] The sexual assault rate also decreased from 1.09 per 100,000 in 2015 to 0.9 per 100,000 in 2022.[4]
Organized crime
The Central Investigation Bureau of Police during a training mission
The Central Investigation Bureau of Police (pol. Centralne Biuro Śledcze Policji, CBŚP) is the law enforcement unit of the Polish Police responsible for fighting organized crime.
The most well-known of the Polish organized crime groups in the 1990s were the so-called Pruszków and Wołomin gangs.[5]
Polish organized crime emerged in the 1990s when the traditional criminal underworld became better organised due to rising corruption.[6] Organized crime groups were well known (1992) for operating sophisticated car theft-rings,[7] as well as for their involvement in drug trafficking (the main drug being amphetamine) and weapon trafficking.
The Pruszków mafia was an organized criminal group that emerged from the Warsaw suburb of Pruszków at the beginning of the 1990s. The group is known for being involved in large car-theft rings, drug trafficking (including cocaine, heroin, hashish and amphetamine), kidnapping, extortion, weapon trafficking (including AK-47's) and murder. Even though law enforcement dealt a severe blow to the Pruszków mafia, it is alleged that Pruszków-based gangs, with or without notice from their former leaders, have regained their strength in recent years and have begun setting up their car-theft rings and connections with Colombian drug cartels again.[8]
A similar organized crime group known as the Wołomin mafia from Wołomin near Warsaw, with whom they fought bloody turf wars,[9] was crushed by the Polish police in cooperation with the German police in a spectacular raid on a highway between Konin and Poznan in September 2011.[10]
According to the Corruption Perception Index for 2015, Poland was ranked as the 29th country with the least perceived corruption out of 168 countries assessed.[11] It is the eleventh successive year in which Poland's score and ranking has improved in the Index.
The law enforcement agency responsible for combating corruption within Poland's public sector is the Central Anticorruption Bureau (pol. Centralne Biuro Antykorupcyjne).
While local organized crime in Poland existed during the interwar period, it has mostly developed since the fall of communism (late 1980s/1990s) with the introduction of free market system in Poland and the lessening of the police (milicja) power.
Crime in Poland is lower than in many countries of Europe.[13]
Newer studies (2009) report that the crime victimisation rate in Poland is constantly decreasing, and in 2008 Poland was at a low end of 25 among the 36 European countries listed.[14][15] A 2004 report on security concerns of European Union residents indicated that the Polish public (along with that of Greece) are the most afraid of crime, a finding which does not correlate with the actual crime threat.[16]
^J. van Dijk, R. Manchin, J. van Kesteren, S. Nevala, G. Hideg The Burden of Crime in the EUArchived 2009-12-29 at the Wayback Machine Research Report: A Comparative Analysis of the European Crime and Safety Survey (EU ICS) 2005
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