The Lubin District Prosecutor’s Office conducted proceedings in this case. In July 2024, the prosecutor filed an indictment. On 19 December 2024, the verdict was handed down. Due to the substantial value of the loss, the case was heard by the District Court in Legnica.

The defendant is a 43-year-old resident of Warsaw, formerly of Ścinawa – Agata N.

As prosecutor Liliana Łukasiewicz, spokesperson for the Legnica District Prosecutor’s Office, explains:

The victim is a Polish woman who has lived abroad for many years. In 2009, she lost her job. Because of loneliness and fear associated with living abroad, she decided to contact a fortune teller, whose advertisement for clairvoyance services she found online. During the conversation, the defendant offered the victim rituals that were supposed to change her life, including bringing back her former partner.

Initially, the fee for the rituals ranged from PLN 300 to PLN 600, but then—unfortunately—their price increased. Spokesperson: – Although the victim had no money, Agata N. encouraged her to continue the sessions, assuring her that repayment could be made later. When, after two months, the victim lost her job and home, the fortune teller assured her that she had to wait for the results and that her situation required further and more powerful rituals.

The victim, under considerable stress after losing her employment and roof over her head, alone abroad during what was then a serious economic crisis and experiencing suicidal thoughts, decided to trust the convicted woman and continued meeting her, going into substantial debt. Prosecutor L. Łukasiewicz:

To gain her trust, Agata N. gave her false information about her age and biography so that they would match the victim’s biography.

The victim continued to use Agata N.’s services until 12 January 2021. Investigators:

When she wanted to end the relationship, the aforementioned woman frightened her with bad energies, a lack of success in her private and professional life, loss of health, the birth of a sick child, and foreign nationals who supposedly would harm her.

The victim feared these threats. At one point, the debt for the rituals grew so large that she was unable to settle it. To do so, at the defendant’s urging and with her organizational support, she began providing sexual services, while the convicted woman assured her that once a month she would perform a ritual that would bring the victim many clients, allowing her to repay her debt.

The aforementioned woman engaged in prostitution to repay her debt to Agata N. The latter helped her keep account of her clients and earnings. On average, the victim transferred approximately £1,400 per month to the convicted woman via Western Union and by depositing cash personally into an account during visits to Poland.

Later, the convicted woman gave the victim her payment card so that the latter could deposit money directly into N.’s account through cash deposit machines. The purpose was to make the cash deposits appear as though the fortune teller herself had made them.

Fearing that the relationship would end, the victim engaged in prostitution for approximately 10 years. During her contacts with the aforementioned woman, Agata N. opposed her taking any other employment.

At the turn of 2020 and 2021, the victim decided that she no longer wanted to work with the defendant. She paid the final amount, then blocked her telephone number and hid from her. She subsequently reported the crime.

During the investigation, a psychological assessment was obtained. Spokesperson: – It found that the victim showed no cognitive or psychological disorders, but was poorly socially adjusted and had a strong sense of alienation and estrangement, which influenced the decisions and actions she took—actions that appeared irrational. The expert also found that the victim had no tendency to confabulate and that, from a psychological standpoint, her testimony was sincere and spontaneous and, as such, could constitute evidence in the ongoing proceedings.

The prosecutor accused Agata N. of, between 2009 and 12 January 2021, posing as a fortune teller with supernatural abilities and deceiving the victim about the possibility of influencing her through divination and magic rituals, leading her to believe that without them she would have no success in her private or professional life, would lose her health, and would give birth to a sick child. In this way, she induced the victim to dispose unfavorably of property of substantial value, in the total amounts of PLN 5,134,894.43 and £74,037.32. Moreover, by exploiting the victim’s difficult circumstances, namely loneliness and the loss of her home and job while abroad, she first induced the aforementioned woman to engage in prostitution in order to obtain payment for the divination and magic rituals, and then derived financial benefits from it.

The offense carried a penalty of between 1 and 10 years’ imprisonment.

Prosecutor:

After the trial, to which the victim traveled from abroad, the District Court in Legnica issued its judgment on 19 December 2024, finding Agata N. guilty of the offense charged, while determining that there were insufficient grounds to find that the convicted woman, by exploiting the victim’s difficult circumstances, had induced her to engage in prostitution. The court convicted Agata N. of fraud involving property of substantial value. This offense carries a penalty of between 1 and 10 years’ imprisonment.

The court sentenced the aforementioned woman to 3 years and 6 months’ imprisonment, a fine of PLN 50,000 (500 daily rates of PLN 100 each), and ordered her to remedy the damage by repaying the victim the money extorted from her.

There will be an appeal

The prosecutor disagreed with this ruling. Investigators:

Maintaining that the legal assessment of the events adopted by the prosecutor was correct—namely, that Agata N.’s actions led the victim to engage in prostitution and that the convicted woman benefited from the aforementioned woman’s prostitution—and consequently that the sentence imposed was too lenient, the prosecutor announced that an appeal would be filed, requesting that the written reasons for the judgment be prepared, after which a final decision on challenging the judgment would be made.

The judgment is therefore not final.