Discussion on the Properties of Relevance, Admissibility and Reliability of Criminal Procedural Evidence

The paper analyzes the legislative definition of criminal procedural evidence. The author gives critical assessment of replacement of the phrase “any factual data” from the Criminal Procedure Code of the RSFSR with the phrase “any information” in the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation. The wording under consideration gave rise to the possibility for some authors to conclude that the law does not indicate the factual nature of information claiming the status of evidence. The main attention is paid to the question of the necessary properties of proofs. The paper points to the erroneous perception by some researchers of the content of Art. 88 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, which manifests itself in endowing the properties of relevance, admissibility and reliability with the status of criteria for evaluating evidence. According to the author, relevance, admissibility and reliability are not criteria for evaluating evidence, but information obtained in the course of proving for the possibility of using it as evidence. The criteria for evaluating the evidence are specified in Part 1 of Art. 17 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation—the law and the conscience of an authorized person who evaluates evidence according to his inner conviction. In contrast to the opinion of researchers who believe that the necessary properties of evidence include only relevance and admissibility, the author argues that each evidence must also have the property of reliability. Only in the presence of the entire set of necessary properties, the information obtained in the course of proving can be endowed with the status of evidence.

The author demonstrates that each of the necessary properties of a proof has an independent content and meaning. Therefore, their confusion is unacceptable. It is concluded that relevance, admissibility and reliability should form the basis for all procedural decisions concerning evidence. According to the author, a clear understanding of the content of these properties would be facilitated by the consolidation of the definitions of these categories in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation. It is also advisable to edit Part 1 of Art. 74 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation by means of defining the concept for criminal procedural evidence as "any factual information" and indicating the purpose of obtaining them as "for the correct resolution of the case".

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