Prima vista proceeding in petty offence or criminal proceeding can't be associated with a ruling establishing that an employment contract or, more broadly, an employment relationship existed between the employing entity and the employee, at a certain time, contrary to a written civil law contract or in the absence of a written contract. Since the Polish legislator criminalises, among other things, conduct detrimental to an employee, it is now clear that this is quite possible. If the subject matter of the petty offence or crime includes the infringement of employee's rights, then proving that such an infringement occurred requires also proving that the injured party was employed based on an employment relationship at the time of the prohibited act. In both criminal and petty offence proceedings, the adjudicating court independently shapes the factual and legal basis for its decision. Thus, it may, contrary to a written contract or despite the absence of a written contract, determine that tempore criminis the employed victim provided work on the basis of an employment relationship. The purpose of this paper is to set out the circumstances in which such a determination may be made and, further, to answer the question of whether it may be made in a situation where the employing entity is not a party to the proceedings.

In the commented judgment, the Supreme Administrative Court dealt with an issue of great practical importance, i.e. the crediting to the payer's arrears of a payment made by a perpetrator of a fiscal offence, who is not a taxpayer, in order to fulfil an obligation to pay a public duty, as determined by a criminal court judgment. This is also an issue of great theoretical importance, because the applicable provisions of Polish tax law do not provide expressis verbis for the expiration of the payer's obligation as a result of making such a payment in the amount exceeding PLN 1,000. The Supreme Administrative Court accepted the concept of deduction, but pointed out that the criminal court, alleging a fiscal offense and imposing the obligation to pay the imposts depleted by this prohibited act, should clearly specify to what extent the payment is to cover the principal and the interest. The gloss accepts the possibility of such a deduction, but strongly questions the concept of suggested additional components of a criminal court judgement.