Investigation Reports: Problems of Procedural Form and Value of Evidence

Abstract

The paper deals with certain problems of the theory and practice of recording investigation activities as a requirement arising from historical traditions of national court proceedings and the general principles of the continental (Romano-Germanic) legal system. The author particularly emphasizes the legal significance of recording investigation activities as an undeniable merit of the Russian model of preliminary investigation. By this mechanism it essentially benefits before the relevant mechanisms applied in the Western countries, particularly in the United States of America. The first part of the article deals with the doctrinal, regulatory and application-oriented aspects of the investigation reports procedure. In particular, the author expresses skepticism about regulation of purely technical rules for recording investigative actions at the "high " legislative level. Such rules of investigative actions recording turn the federal law into a step-by-step instruction for illiterate and uncultured Investigators. In addition, a new application-oriented technology is proposed to familiarize investigation participants with the contents of protocols. The technology is based on the maximum comfort regime that is consistent with the legal value of the procedural form and that implies an adequate level of professionalism, legal awareness and responsibility of investigative officers. The second part of the article deals with the evidential value of investigative protocols in establishing circumstances relevant to a criminal case. Using the methodology of the previously formed concept of a "non-verbal" method of procedural cognition, taking into account the legal ambiguity of Art. 83 of the RF Code of Criminal Procedure, the author concludes that there is a serious doctrinal and legislative error, namely, the violation of the logical uniformity of the results of various investigative and other procedural actions. In the author's opinion, in some cases the evidence means a cognitive result, and in other cases the protocol itself is the form of recording of that result. In this regard, it is proposed to use unified methodological approaches both to the results of investigation activities and to the relevant protocols. The author argues that the evidence provided by Art. 83 The RF Code of Criminal Procedure, should henceforth be called the results of non-verbal investigative (judicial) actions.