Stanisław Zarakowski


General Stanisław Zarakowski was a chief military prosecutor in the People's [Republic of Poland] who was famous for his role in several trials of Polish Underground State officers which resulted in many death sentences.
Zarakowski was born to a local landowner in Svolna village in Vilna Governorate. His family's estate was nationalized during the Bolshevik revolution when he was ten years old. They moved to Vilnius, where Zarakowski graduated from the law faculty of the Wilno University. During World War II he fled to the Soviet Union and arrived back in war-torn Poland with the Soviet-sponsored Polish People's Army. A hardline Stalinist, Zarakowski was assigned a job with the Chief Military Prosecutor Office and quickly rose to become the Chief Military Prosecutor of the People's Republic of Poland.

Stalinist reign of terror

Zarakowski was the main prosecutor in various Stalinist trials including the infamous Trial of the Generals in 1951 against commanders of the Armia Krajowa including General Stanisław Tatar. The trial resulted in over 20 death sentences against high-ranking officers. Zarakowski conducted the trial of Kazimierz Pużak and other politicians of the Polish People's Party shortly before the so-called people's referendum of 1946, as well as the Stalinist show trial of the Roman Curia of Kraków. The pronounced death sentences were not enforced although Father Fudali died in unexplained circumstances. Throughout the 1950s the Ministry of Public Security with Dir. Julia Brystiger at the helm of the 5th Department, incarcerated and routinely tortured Roman Catholic priests investigated for "treason". Before 1953 already, 37 of them were killed including 54 monks.
Zarakowski was a Communist party advisor to MON along with General Roman Romkowski and a few other officials. He was also the man to order the presiding judge to sentence Capt. Witold Pilecki, the "hero of Auschwitz" to the death penalty, according to IPN institute. Zarakowski was fired from his government job in 1956 during the Polish October revolution and his surviving victims were released.

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