A 63-year-old man who entered the offices of opposition party Law and Justice (PiS) in Łódź, in October 2010, before shooting one man dead and stabbing and injuring another, has been sentenced to life in jail. The victims worked as officials in the offices of PiS politicians.

Ryszard Cyba, who was sentenced on Tuesday, will not be eligible for parole for at least 30 years. In addition to receiving a life sentence the guilty man will also have to pay a total of zł.140,000 to the family of the deceased man, Marek Rosiak, and to Paweł Kowalski, who was stabbed in the incident.

The presiding judge justified the verdict by saying that the defendant's only regret was not being able to kill both men.

The judge explained that according to Mr Cyba's testimony, because he was unable to carry out his original plan to kill PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński the defendant had decided to kill “any other people from the PiS party.”

In the aftermath of the crime, it was discovered that Mr Cyba had once been a member of the governing Civic Platform (PO) party. Mr Kaczyński said that PO’s “hate campaign” against his party was responsible for the tragedy.

The defendant has two weeks to appeal the court's decision.

Izabela Depczyk