Who's lying in Krzysztof Olewnik's grave?

22nd January 2010

One of the most tragic and controversial criminal cases in post-communist Poland has been turned upside down after allegations surfaced that the body presumed to be that of a murder victim may in fact be someone else’s.

Gdansk prosecutors have agreed to a request from the family of Krzysztof Olewnik for an exhumation to see whether the body lying in a cemetery near Plock is that of the 27-year-old businessman.

Olewnik was kidnapped in 2001, held for ransom, tortured and murdered despite his family paying a ransom of EUR 300,000. Following a witness statement a body, presumed to that of victim’s, was recovered from woodland near Olsztyn in 2006.

But now it turns out that the auth ...