Communist crimes (Polish: zbrodnie komunistyczne), is a legal definition used in Polish criminal law.
The concept of a communist crime is also used more broadly internationally, and is employed by human rights NGOs as well as government agencies such as the Unitas Foundation, the Institute for Information on the Crimes of Communism, the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, the Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes in Romania and the Office for the Documentation and the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism.
In legal terminology – as defined by the Article 2.1 of the Journal of Laws (Dziennik Ustaw, DzU) of the Republic of Poland issued 18 December 1998, "Communist crimes" constitute crimes committed by the functionaries of the Communist apparatus between September 17, 1939 (Soviet invasion of Poland) and December 31, 1989 (fall of Communism). The crimes defined therein form either political repression or direct violation of human rights of an individual or a group; including those, otherwise named in Polish criminal law of that particular time. The concept also covers several other illegal activities prohibited by the Polish law already since 1932, such as falsification of documents and using them with the intent to cause harm to people mentioned in them.