Features of the process of evidence in criminal procedure of the United States of America

Abstract

Recent years have been marked by a great growth of comparative legal research in various branches of legal science, which are gaining a growing number of supporters. The given process makes it possible to show the originality of certain branches of law, their institutions, norms in different legal systems, to compare the data of a specific branch of law with similar branches in other legal systems, and to reveal national differences. The practical significance of the given activity lies in the study and generalization of both positive and negative legal experience of foreign countries. In today’s transparent world, with the growing importance of the international component in the fight against crime, a legal expert needs knowledge that goes beyond the national legal field for a reason, with the purpose of its proper use in the process of international cooperation in criminal proceedings between states in particular.
 Nowadays there is the process of convergence of various criminal procedural systems of the world. And in this regard, the Anglo-American system of the criminal procedure, the United States of America (hereinafter the USA) in particular, is quite interesting. The given system has distinctive features that are different from the national system and deserve attention. They are the sources of the US criminal procedural law which include judicial precedent, regulations and legal doctrine. The peculiarity of the given system is that it is based on adversarial proceedings and justice, it generates phenomena of the criminal procedure, namely the plea agreement, the jury trial, the concept of restorative justice, the discretionary powers of persons conducting criminal proceedings, etc. Yet another characteristic feature of the Anglo-American system of the US criminal procedure is the specifics of the implementation of evidentiary criminal procedural activity.
 The focus of the given article is on the study of the specificity of evidentiary activity, such as questions related to: the concept, classification, sources and properties of evidence in the criminal procedure of the United States of America, the peculiarities of the process of evidence at certain stages of the procedure, the legal position of certain subjects of evidence. The materials of the article are of both theoretical and practical value. They can be used for further scientific research on the peculiarities of national criminal procedural evidence, as well as for the proper understanding and implementation of its law enforcement criminal procedural activity.