Order of the District Court of Warsaw, 1st Civil Division, dated May 14, 2014
I C 132/12

1. Persons expressing a desire to join the group (interested in it) may submit a declaration to join the group within the statutory deadline. Exceeding this deadline has certain consequences, since the law excludes the possibility of restoring the deadline for filing the declaration. Failure to submit the declaration within the statutory deadline thus renders it ineffective. The deadline for joining the group is a strict one, so the person wishing to exercise the granted right to join the group only during it should do so within the deadline, and the submission of the declaration should be substantiated. Joining the group after the expiration of the specified statutory deadline should therefore be considered ineffective, i.e. not producing the legal effects that the law attaches to joining the group.
2. Failure to provide even the date of submission of the statement when presented in the proceedings after the deadline set by the Court in the press announcement precludes the possibility of assuming as probable the submission of the statement within the required time limit.
3. The court should determine already at the stage of examining the composition of the class whether the claims of individual class members, if any, are not time-barred. The purpose of determining the composition of the group is to verify that the claims asserted are of one type, based on the same factual basis. Thus, it is the Court’s role at the initial stage of the proceedings to determine the prerequisites for the admissibility of the claim individually defining the situation of the group member, so that at the next stage of the proceedings it will be possible to decide on the merits of the case in terms of the common prerequisites. Otherwise, the substantive adjudication of the case would not differ in any way from the proceedings conducted in the ordinary course with the participation of many plaintiffs in disregard of the provisions of the Law on the Pursuit of Claims in Class Proceedings, and the Court would individually have to consider whether the statute of limitations was interrupted with respect to individual class members, or whether there was an abuse of rights by the defendant in connection with the raising of the statute of limitations.
4. The demand to establish the defendant’s liability in a class action is not subject to the statute of limitations.

The District Court of Warsaw, 1st Civil Division, in the following composition:

Presiding Judge: SSO Alicja Fronczyk

Judges:                 SSO Bożena Jaskuła, SSO Jacek Bajak

Having recognized on May 14, 2014 in Warsaw at a closed session the case of the claim of B. C. – representing a group consisting of [data 48 persons] against the State Treasury – Minister of Health for determination,

decides:

Determine that the group consists of: [data 43 class members].