Lenka Bradáčová defends her prosecutors. But who defends the law before the public prosecutor's office itself?

It all started seemingly innocently. One citizen repeatedly turned to the public prosecutor's office. He objected to misconduct in criminal cases related to the protection of minors, drew attention to outstanding legal issues, and demanded respect for procedural rules. Instead of a convincing answer, however, he read in one of the official notices that his actions represented "a convulsive effort" and "a querulous approach". The author of these words was the public representative of the High Prosecutor's Office in Prague JUDr. Tomas Turk.

One would assume that a public prosecutor, whose professional mission is to protect the public interest and legality, would be able to distinguish the consistent exercise of rights from their actual abuse. If a citizen files another complaint because he considers the previous answer to be incomplete or draws attention to new facts, he cannot automatically be labeled as a complainer. But this is where the story begins, which tells a lot about the functioning of control in the public prosecutor's office system.

A citizen filed a complaint. Not in order to force the criminal prosecution of a specific person, but to assess whether the public prosecutor did not exceed the boundaries of professional and impartial performance of his duties with his formulations. Act No. 283/1993 Coll. at the same time, he is not indeterminate on this issue. In § 24, it imposes on prosecutors the duty to act impartially, to refrain from expressing personal negative attitudes and to maintain due respect for the persons with whom they deal. This is not a recommendation from social etiquette. These are legal professional obligations.

And what was the reaction? Senior Prosecutor in Prague Mgr. Zdeněk Štěpánek came to the conclusion that the mentioned formulations are not inappropriate. The complainant therefore turned to the highest state attorney Lenka Bradáčová. Here was an opportunity not only to confirm that the public prosecutor's office can make decisions about others, but also to show that it can critically review the actions of its own representatives.

On October 5, 2026, the answer came. The Chief Prosecutor announced that she fully agrees with the conclusions of the Chief Prosecutor. She found no doubt. She dismissed the submission as unfounded and reminded that the settlement is final.

This is where the fundamental problem arises. Not because the superior authority must comply with every complaint. They don't have to. But because we expect more from a real review than a finding that the previous authority had the file, met the deadline and its conclusion is correct. A complaint handled on time may not be a properly handled complaint. And a mere examination of the file does not yet answer the question of whether all the decisive objections have really been dealt with.

Even more surprising is the argumentation used to defend the questionable expressions. The Public Prosecutor's Office pointed out that similar words can be found in the decisions of the Supreme Administrative Court, the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court. As if the appearance of a certain expression in a court decision constituted a universal confirmation of its appropriateness.

But law doesn't work that way. The legal meaning of words is not determined by a dictionary of their previous uses, but by specific circumstances. The court can evaluate the procedural procedure as abusive in a certain case, if it has adequate grounds for this. However, it cannot be concluded from this that a similar designation is automatically suitable for every citizen who repeatedly requests correction.

Is it really that difficult to explain which particular filing was an abuse of right? What actions justified the designation as querulatory? Why couldn't the relevant legal conclusion be communicated without an expressive comment? And were the reasons for which the citizen repeatedly turned to the public prosecutor's office even taken into account?

Lenka Bradáčová's explanation does not provide a convincing individualized answer to these questions. Instead of a detailed analysis, the confirmation of the correctness of the previous procedure prevails. This is not evidence of illegality or a deliberate cover-up by the prosecutor. However, it is a legitimate reason for sharp criticism of the quality of institutional control.

In addition, the whole case has another dimension. At one stage, the original submission was considered primarily as a request for further supervision. Only subsequently did the Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office explicitly confirm that the essential part was a separate complaint about inappropriate behavior according to Section 16b of the Public Prosecutor's Office Act. The complaint was eventually settled by the competent authority. However, this does not remove the question of why it was necessary to repeatedly explain the difference between a complaint about the conduct of an official and a request for a review of a legal conclusion.

At the same time, the law expressly stipulates that submissions are assessed according to their actual content. If a citizen draws attention to inappropriate behavior, this objection should be considered as a complaint about inappropriate behavior. If it points to deficiencies in supervision, the appropriate supervision regime must be correctly determined. Administrative convenience must not substitute for legal qualifications.

The most troubling thing about this story is not a single sentence from the prosecutor or a single dismissive statement. It is the danger of creating an institutional culture in which it is considered more important to confirm the actions of a subordinate than to openly review his possible mistakes.

Of course, the mere fact that a complaint was rejected does not prove the existence of such a culture. But the control body must not only proceed correctly, but also be able to explain in a credible manner why it considers a specific action to be correct. Otherwise, the impression of a closed system is created, in which individual levels confirm each other's conclusions, while the applicant is still waiting for an answer to the substance of his objections.

Lenka Bradáčová is at the head of an institution whose authority is supposed to be based on the law, expertise and public trust. Its role is not to automatically vouch for the complainants. In the same way, it should not be the mission of the supreme prosecutor's office to provide unreserved institutional support to its own prosecutors. There is a fundamental difference between the legitimate protection of the professional independence of prosecutors and the uncritical defense of their conduct.

This is not a personal dispute with Lenka Bradáčová. It's a matter of principle. If the chief public prosecutor considers the expressions used by her subordinates to be reasonable, she should be able to convincingly explain not only that similar words appear in the jurisprudence, but especially why she was justified in the case under consideration.

It is from this that there is control. Not to protect the comfort of office, but to check the exercise of public power. Not to discourage the citizen from further submissions, but to distinguish reasonable reservations from truly abusive behavior.

And now come the unavoidable questions. Who is responsible for the fact that the statutory professional duties are not convincingly compared to specific actions in the notification? Who will ensure that the review is not just an administrative confirmation of a previous opinion? And who will control the controllers if the highest level of the system marks the matter as final?

The answer cannot be that the citizen simply files too many complaints. Such a conclusion would be a dangerous reversal of the meaning of the rule of law. Public authorities are not entitled to assume the correctness of their own actions just because their procedure has already been approved by someone within the system.

Finality of appellate review does not mean infallibility. The authority of the office does not imply the correctness of every official statement. And mutual confirmation of opinions is not in itself evidence of truly effective control.

If the public is to trust the public prosecutor's office, they must see that the legal rules also apply to its representatives. That Section 24 of the Public Prosecutor's Office Act is not just a provision on paper. And that an answer to a legitimate legal objection will not be replaced by an evaluative judgment about the person who raised it.

Lenka Bradáčová defended her state representatives in this particular case. This is a proven fact. Whether at the same time she sufficiently protected the legal requirements for professionalism and impartiality is a question to which, in my assessment, her briefing did not yield a convincing answer.

And that is precisely why this case deserves public discussion. Not because of one person or one word, but because of a fundamental question that goes beyond the whole dispute: Will the law or institutional loyalty come first in the Czech public prosecutor's office?

Source:

1.      Act No. 283/1993 Coll., on the Public Prosecutor's Office, as amended, in particular § 2 paragraph 2, § 13a–13e, § 16a, § 16b and § 24. Available from:https://e-sbirka.gov.cz/sb/1993/283

2.      Resolution of the Presidency of the Czech National Council No. 2/1993 Coll., on the promulgation of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms as part of the constitutional order of the Czech Republic, in particular Article 2(2), Article 10(1) and Article 36(1). Available from:https://e-sbirka.gov.cz/sb/1993/2

3.      Decree No. 23/1994 Coll., on the rules of procedure of the public prosecutor's office, the establishment of branches of certain public prosecutor's offices and details of actions performed by legal agents, as amended. e-Collection [online]. Available from:https://e-sbirka.gov.cz/sb/1994/23