Постанова про визнання речовими доказами як кримінальне процесуальне рішення
Resolution on the Recognition of Material Evidence as a Criminal Procedural Decision

Summary/Abstract: Despite the adoption of the current criminal procedural law of Ukraine in 2012, some procedural issues remain debatable, controversial and, in some cases, unclear. One such issue is the adoption of a criminal procedural decision by an investigator, detective, inquiry officer or prosecutor, in the form of a ruling, regarding the recognition of objects, items or documents as material evidence. After all, the legislator has not established a clear rule requiring the drafting of this type of criminal procedural document, but representatives of the prosecution make such procedural decisions at the pre-trial investigation stage, which gives rise to discussions on the part of the defence, whose representatives continue to actively argue that it is unlawful to adopt such a criminal procedural decision as a ruling on the recognition of material evidence. The purpose of this article is to analyse the legal phenomenon of criminal procedural decisions made at the pre-trial investigation stage by investigators, detectives, interrogators, and prosecutors in the form of rulings recognising material evidence, and to clarify the approach taken in this area by national courts and the European Court of Human Rights. Taking into account the stated objective of the article, based on the application of the analysis method, the current criminal procedural legislation of Ukraine, certain provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine of 1960, and the practice of national courts of first instance were analysed. The scientific opinions of individual scholars on the necessity of adopting such a criminal procedural decision in the form of a ruling on the recognition of material evidence were examined, which provided grounds for defining the place of such a legal phenomenon in the system of legal knowledge. In addition, based on a comparison, a study was conducted of the ECHR’s practice in determining the standards of legality and proportionality of seizing property from a person as material evidence during a pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings and determining the importance of the impact on the practice of making criminal procedural decisions in criminal proceedings at the national level. The study provides grounds for asserting that, at present, there is no consensus among scholars and practitioners regarding the interpretation of certain provisions of the CPC of Ukraine. In addition, there remain certain problems in understanding the essence of criminal procedural decisions taken by the rosecution at the pre-trial investigation stage, which is a basis for further research and regulation of the content of certain provisions at the legislative level.

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