Posts on social media have claimed that Ihor M., 31, was not handcuffed because of his nationality.
NASK, a state research institute that monitors online disinformation, said that a photo of the detained Ukrainian man was being used to promote false claims of preferential treatment.
Nationality plays no role in such decisions, the watchdog stressed.
Ihor M. is suspected of attacking five people, four men and a woman, at a Benedictine abbey in Jarosław last Thursday.
One of the victims, a priest, died. The others were taken to hospitals in Jarosław, Przeworsk and Przemyśl.
Prosecutors initially announced charges including murder and attempted murder.
However, psychiatrists later found that the suspect had acute polymorphic psychotic disorder, which prosecutors said prevented him from being questioned or formally charged at this stage.
The Jarosław District Prosecutor’s Office said it would ask a court to place the suspect in pre-trial detention for three months in a hospital setting.
'Different standards'
One widely shared post on X compared a photo of Ihor M. being escorted by police, his hands bandaged and no handcuffs visible, with images of handcuffed Polish suspects.
NASK says the comparison was used to suggest that police apply different rules to Ukrainians.
Małgorzata Szumna, an analyst with the watchdog's fact-checking team, said officers decide on handcuffing based on a suspect's behaviour, the risk of escape and the danger to others.
In some cases, such as when a person is injured or has a mental disorder, a doctor or prosecutor may also have a say.
The rules are set out in Poland's 2013 Act on Direct Coercive Measures and Firearms, she said, and nationality is not a factor.
Other posts claimed that Polish media deliberately played down the attack to protect the image of Ukrainians.
NASK says such claims are part of a wider narrative that violence by Ukrainians is rising, and that the state is unwilling or unable to protect its citizens.
"Accusations are made that the justice system treats Ukrainians more leniently and that the media hide information about crimes involving them," Szumna said.
She said such messages tie hostility towards Ukrainians to a broader loss of trust in state institutions.
'Wider threat'
NASK also found posts on Facebook, TikTok and X presenting a single crime as evidence of a wider threat from Ukrainians.
Some referred to the Volhynia massacres, the 1943 killings of Poles by Ukrainian nationalists, which remain a sensitive issue between the two countries.
Szumna said the attack had intensified anti-Ukrainian narratives already circulating in Poland.
NASK has recorded a sharp rise in hate speech aimed at Ukrainians, which it says has reached its highest level since the first half of July 2026.
Some of the claims were spread by anonymous accounts known for disinformation, the watchdog said, as well as by supporters and politicians linked to the far-right Confederation and Confederation of the Polish Crown parties.
The latter is led by Grzegorz Braun, who has been charged with Holocaust denial over his claim that the Auschwitz gas chambers are "fake," among other offences.
Szumna urged people to be cautious about unverified information, to check original sources and to look for confirmation from other reliable outlets.
"High public interest in one event can be used to circulate false or unverified claims intended to create the impression that a threat is widespread and growing," she said.
Bishop Krzysztof Zadarko, who chairs the Polish Bishops' Conference Council for Migrants and Refugees, appealed for the attack not to be used to fuel hatred against Ukrainians, saying it was "incompatible with Christianity."
Separately, a priest wounded in the attack has urged Poles not to blame the entire Ukrainian nation.
(pg/ał)
Source: PAP