Schindler's List co-producer 'must serve prison term'

A Warsaw court ruled today that the Polish co-producer of the Oscar-winning film Schindler’s List must immediately start serving his two-year prison term for his role in a bribery scandal that touched the highest levels of government, a court official said.

In December, a panel of three judges sentenced Lew Rywin, 59, to two years and fined him 100,000 zlotys (€23,900) as an accessory to influence-peddling.

He was to start serving the term today, but his lawyers tried to postpone his imprisonment and have sought a medical opinion of his fitness to be in prison. They say he has diabetes and heart problems.

“The court rejected Lew Rywin’s defence lawyers’ motion,” said Monika Brzozowska, a spokeswoman for the Warsaw Provincial Court.

“It means Rywin has to report in Warsaw’s Rakowiecka prison today before 4pm (3pm Irish time),” she said.

Marek Malecki, a Rywin lawyer, said they filed a complaint on the decision, “immediately after the court made its announcement”.

Rywin will “report at the prison today with the intention of serving his term,” Malecki said. He refused to comment on the court’s decision.

The lawyers have been working to have the prison term cancelled.

Last year, the court ruled that Rywin approached publishers of a leading newspaper in 2002 to solicit a bribe equivalent to €13.5m.

In exchange, he allegedly offered to lobby for changes to a proposed media law that would have allowed the newspaper’s publisher to buy a nationwide broadcaster.

The court said Rywin falsely claimed to represent Leszek Miller, prime minister at the time, and some unspecified “group holding power”.

Months of parliamentary hearings in the scandal made headlines and riveted Poles in 2003.

Rywin was the owner of Heritage Films, a Polish company that co-produced Steven Spielberg’s 1993 Oscar-winning Schindler’s List and Roman Polanski’s The Pianist, which was honoured with the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 2002.