Evaluative Concepts and Their Importance in Ensuring the Rights and Legitimate Interests of Participants of Criminal Proceedings

Abstract

Introduction: the authors reveal the essence of evaluative concepts in criminal proceedings, evaluative concepts in selecting measures of restriction, evaluative concepts used by higher courts and evaluative concepts in the procedure of interpretation of legal norms. Invoking this topic is due to the purpose of consideration of the term “evaluative concept” in the criminal process, as well as the study of certain concepts that have nonunambiguous interpretation in the theory of criminal procedure law, affecting the guarantees of protection of the rights of participants in the criminal process. Methods: the methodological framework for this study is the universal dialectical method of cognition of social phenomena and processes. In the context of this method and in connection with it, the general scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction and generalization) and the specific scientific methods (comparative law and formal legal) are used. Results: considering the category of “evaluative concepts” in the process of interpreting the norms of criminal procedure law, the authors draw attention to the fact that the role of evaluative concepts is not limited to understanding the objective meaning of criminal procedure law, but also associated with precise understanding of the content of the legal norm, necessary in the ambiguity of the normative rules of the law; the paper presents the examples of broad interpretation, requiring the formulation of evaluative concepts in the criminal process and the issues raised by them to ensure the rights of participants in criminal proceedings. Conclusions: as a result of the study, the authors come to the conclusion that one should not go by limiting the right of higher courts to use evaluative concepts, and therefore, limiting the right to broad interpretation of criminal procedure law, as this will not contribute to setting the criminal process, in which the rights of the parties are protected. However, the use of evaluative concepts should be extremely in-depth and accurate, not allowing them to use their discretionary powers to limit the rights of participants in the process.