Seven armed officers enter home of Marsz Niepodległości head over unconfirmed killing report

The notification and the raid

The Warsaw IV district police command received a notification on Saturday, 24 October 2026, about a possible killing at a flat in Warsaw's Wola district. The post's author also described preparations to take their own life, so police treated the call as urgent and sent several patrols to the address around noon. Officers were warned that the alarm might be false, but police later explained that the operation could not be called off until the danger was verified. Bartosz Malewski, president of the Marsz Niepodległości association and a lawyer, was alone in the flat. He says seven officers in bulletproof vests, carrying shields, came in and that two of them already held firearms. He was ordered onto the stairwell with his hands behind his head while the officers searched the flat, and they ended the operation once the danger was ruled out. Malewski's accounts differ on its length: about 30 minutes in some reports, and about an hour and a half in another account he gave.

Police statement and proceedings

The Warsaw police headquarters confirmed the intervention in a statement on Monday, 26 October 2026. It said the post had not been confirmed at that stage and could be an attempt to provoke a false alarm that draws an emergency response, and it urged caution. Police then accepted a notification of possible offences, including article 238 of the Criminal Code, which covers reporting a crime that was never committed, and article 107 of the data protection act. The Warsaw Regional Bar Council was also informed of the case. Police said they are working to locate the person behind the report.

Malewski's account and possible motives

Malewski described the entry on X and on the wPolsce24 programme Na linii ognia. He said he first assumed the banging came from a neighbour, until he heard officers shout that they were police and to open up. He calls the report completely false and says the officers were used as a tool, a claim he has put in a notification of the crime he says he fell victim to.

“Someone used the officers as a tool and led to sending an armed unit to the door of an innocent man.”

He lists several possible motives: retaliation or pressure over his defence of Piotr W., who was detained on 16 October during protests near the Constitutional Tribunal, and intimidation of the organisers before the march on 11 November. He notes that the raid came 18 days before that march, a period of intense preparation. He also recalls threats linked to the march in 2024, 2025 and June 2025, none of which were carried out, and says he documented each one and reported it to the relevant law enforcement bodies. He does not rule out that foreign services wanted to destabilise the state and undermine trust in the police.

Reactions from the march

Marcin Osowski, chief of staff of the Marsz Niepodległości, spoke to Telewizja Republika and said the group was in deep shock. He described the situation as very suspicious and said that one officer, once things had calmed down, remarked that someone had apparently played a joke on Malewski.

“This situation is very suspicious.”

Michał Rachoń, a commentator on the same channel, noted that police had entered another home that weekend, which police had presented as a mistake. The reports so far do not show that the two episodes were linked.

Open questions

The reports do not identify who made the notification, and the investigation is still ongoing. Malewski says the key question is who knowingly misled the officers and for what purpose. The Marsz Niepodległości is due to take place on 11 November 2026, and the organisers say preparations are under way.