3. Right to contact an attorney or a proxy being a barrister or a solicitor Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms Article 6(3)(c) Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights: (…) c) to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing or, if he has not sufficient means to pay for legal assistance, to be given it free when the interests of justice so require; Executive Penal Code (Dz.U. of 1997, No 90, item 557, as amended) Article 8(3) A convict deprived of liberty can contact his attorney or proxy being a barrister or a solicitor without the presence of other persons. Correspondence with these persons shall not be subject to censorship and detainment, while conversations during visits or on the phone shall not be subject to control. Supervision on the correspondence with an attorney may take place by means of opening the mail only in case of reasonable suspicion that a letter contains objects whose possession, storage, transfer, sending or turnover is banned. The opening shall be performed in the presence of a convict and the penitentiary judge shall be informed about this activity, by providing the reason and results. The provision of Article 225 § 3 of the Code of Criminal Procedure shall apply accordingly. Article 102 A convict has the right to, in particular: (…) 7) communicate with an attorney, proxy, competent probation officer and a representative of choice, referred to in Article 42 (…). During preventive visits, the representatives of the National Preventive Mechanism pay particular attention to the way of executing the right of persons deprived of liberty to contact an attorney and a proxy (Article 8 § 3 of the Executive Penal Code).In many establishments persons in pre-trial detention stated that they had no possibility to contact an attorney by phone (e.g. PDC in Wrocław and Koszalin). Directors of units confirmed that such form of contact was temporarily unavailable. On 24 February 2010, the Human Rights Defender filed a petittion to the General Director of the Prison Service46, in which he indicated that the provision of Article 102 (7) of the Executive Penal Code guarantees the right of a convict to contact an attorney and a proxy.It includes, above all, freedom from control in the scope of contacting frequency and respect for confidentiality. The provision of Article 8(3) of the Executive Penal Code also provides that a convict deprived of liberty can contact his attorney or proxy being a barrister or a solicitor without the presence of other persons.Correspondence with these persons is not subject to censorship and detention and conversations during visits and on the phone are not controlled. In the Defender’s view, previously gained experience leads to a conclusion that the regulations concerning phone conversations with entities referred to in Art. 8 (3) of the Executive Penal Code were insufficient and should be made more precise in internal rules of procedure of penitentiary units. The vast majority of rules of procedure do not specify the procedure for the exercise of right to contact these entities. It is clear that proper fulfillment of the norm included in Art. 8 (3) of the Executive Penal Code serves the purpose of exercising the right to defence, guaranteed by Article 42(2) of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland.The Defender also addressed the Minister of Justice47 with regard to the same case, appealing for legislative action leading to repeal                                                              46 47 RPO-111649-VII/10 RPO-637904-VII/10