Polish Commission Proposes Court Records Without a Stenographer, Aided by AI

The Civil Law Codification Commission (Komisja Kodyfikacyjna Prawa Cywilnego) has drafted amendments to Poland's Code of Civil Procedure (Kodeks postępowania cywilnego) that would open the door to preparing trial records without a court stenographer. In their place would come automatic speech-recognition transcription, supervised by the presiding judge.

What the draft proposes

Under the proposed Article 157 par. 1(2) of the Code, courts would be able to prepare the record of a hearing without a stenographer, using appropriate IT systems operating under the presiding judge's supervision. This would be complemented by Article 158 par. 3(1), which sets out the rules for signing such a document, reserving that act exclusively for the presiding judge.

The Commission justifies the proposal by pointing to advances in speech recognition and natural language processing, which today allow for real-time, faithful documentation of court proceedings. The draft's explanatory memorandum stresses that the technology is meant to support the judge, not to make procedural decisions on its own.

Where it would apply

According to the draft's authors, the solution would work best in straightforward cases, for example in second-instance proceedings, where the record is often limited to routine elements and does not cover actions such as witness examinations. In practice, this is meant to allow for more rational use of court staff, reducing the need to involve a stenographer wherever technical conditions allow a hearing to be reliably documented without one.

Transcribing the course of a court hearing is potentially a good space for AI deployment - Prof. Monika Namysłowska, University of Łódź, chair of the team preparing the draft

Reactions from judges and lawyers

The draft has drawn interest from the judiciary. Dr. Tomasz Niewiadomski, a judge at the Regional Court in Warsaw (Sąd Okręgowy w Warszawie), called automatic transcription of hearings using artificial intelligence a very interesting solution, noting that automatic transcription would allow a complete record of the hearing to be created in real time.

Automatic transcription would allow a complete record of the hearing to be created in real time - Dr. Tomasz Niewiadomski, judge at the Regional Court in Warsaw

Dr. Maria Dymitruk of the Center for Legal and Economic Research on Electronic Communication (Centrum Badań Problemów Prawnych i Ekonomicznych Komunikacji Elektronicznej) at the University of Wrocław, a legal counsel working on the draft, emphasizes its practical dimension. In her view, a solution allowing a record to be prepared without a stenographer is especially significant in straightforward cases, where assigning an extra person just to record the course of a hearing can be disproportionate to the case's actual complexity.

Why AI stays on the sidelines for now

Notably, the draft's authors deliberately did not introduce separate, detailed regulations on the use of artificial intelligence in proceedings at this stage. The Commission concluded that the topic requires deeper reflection on procedural safeguards before rules directly addressing algorithms that process evidence or support the assessment of case material can be drafted. The change to Articles 157 and 158 of the Code therefore concerns only the technical side of documenting hearings, not AI's substantive involvement in adjudication.

This sets the Polish proposal apart from some of the debate underway in other countries, where artificial intelligence is also being tested for analyzing case files or suggesting rulings. The Codification Commission opted for a more cautious, gradual approach, starting with the most procedurally neutral task: recording the course of a hearing.

Implications for Polish courts

Staff shortages among stenographers have for years been one of the practical problems raised by common courts, alongside lengthy proceedings and judges' administrative workload. Automating record-keeping in simpler cases could partly relieve this staff and let them be redirected to tasks requiring greater precision, such as recording complex hearings involving multiple witnesses.

The draft is part of a broader package of changes prepared by the Civil Law Codification Commission, covering more than a dozen areas of digitalization in civil procedure, including electronic access for legal representatives to court case files. For now, the proposal awaits further stages of the legislative process, and its final shape may still change during consultations.