CONCEPTS OF ADMISSIBILITY OF EVIDENCE AND THEIR IMPLEMENTATION IN THE CRIMINAL PROCESS OF UKRAINE
Authors:   Kharkiv National University of Internal Affairs, Kharkiv, Ukraine, Teslenko І. О. 
Published: October 2023

The author of the article examines the provisions of the current criminal procedural legislation of Ukraine, the decision of the European Court of Human Rights and the modern practice of the courts of Ukraine regarding the application of the concept of “fruits of a poisoned tree” and exceptions to it. It has been proven that establishing the commission of a relevant criminal offense by a certain person or, conversely, his non-involvement in its commission is carried out on the basis of evidence provided to the court by the participants in the adversarial procedure. Determining the admissibility of the evidence presented to the court is a guarantee of the balance of rights of all participants in the criminal proceedings and ensuring that the court adopts a legal and fair decision on the case. In this context, the implementation of the concepts formulated in the criminal trials of foreign countries, regarding issues of admissibility of evidence, to the current criminal procedural legislation of Ukraine becomes important and requires additional research. The purpose of the article is to study the essence of concepts that are an exception to the rule of “fruits of the poisoned tree”, to implement their application in the judicial practice of Ukraine, in order to obtain new scientific knowledge and ensure correct understanding. In the world practice and the practice of the European Court of Human Rights, in particular, certain concepts were formed when solving the issue of admissibility of evidence in criminal proceedings, which are implemented at the present time and in the judicial practice of Ukraine. The most widespread and well-known of them in matters of inadmissibility of evidence is the concept of “fruit of the poisoned tree”, the essence of which is that if the source of evidence is improper, then all the evidence obtained with its help will be the same. However, at the present time there are already a certain number of concepts that are an exception to it and offer a different approach to the issue of recognizing evidence as admissible. It is noted that all exceptions from the concept of “fruits of the poisoned tree” have common features, in particular: first, the focus of the research is not on the violation as such, but on its essence; secondly, on establishing the impact of certain violations on ensuring a fair trial; thirdly, the credibility of the relevant evidence and the ability of the court to reach certain conclusions regarding the establishment of a person’s guilt in committing the relevant criminal offense. That is, they provide opportunities to move away from formalism in matters related to: admissibility of evidence, ensuring a fair trial and achieving the goal of criminal proceedings. It was concluded that the application, when the issue of admissibility of evidence in criminal proceedings is resolved, along with the concept of “fruit of the poisoned tree” of other concepts, which are actually an exception to the stated one, gives flexibility to the criminal process in the matter of recognizing evidence as admissible, which ensures the fairness of the judicial process for both sides and a certain balance between the public interests of society and the person who is brought to criminal responsibility, his rights and freedoms. The justice of the process as a whole and the decision (sentence) of the court, as a document that is accepted according to its consequences, can be achieved by transparency and comprehensibility of the applied norms and procedures for the participants in the process and society.