The cassation court: limits on examining evidence

Positions of the trial and appellate courts: the lower courts found the defendant guilty and convicted her under Article 121(2) of the Criminal Code.

In the cassation appeal, the convicted person stated that the trial judgment rested on false witness testimony and insisted that experts, the injured party and witnesses be summoned before the cassation court for re-examination and confrontations.

Position of the Criminal Cassation Court: the lower courts’ decisions were upheld.

Reasoning of the Criminal Cassation Court: the panel observed that the Code does not require repeated questioning of the victim and witnesses or the summoning of experts where their testimony and opinions have already been fully and comprehensively examined and the applications do not properly identify new significant circumstances. Under Article 356, an expert is summoned solely to clarify an existing opinion. Procedural steps to review or rebut expert findings require substantiated doubts about the expert’s qualifications or a breach of the examination procedure. Similarly, repeated questioning of the injured party or witnesses is permissible only where the trial reveals that the person can testify about circumstances on which they have not previously been questioned, under Articles 352(14) and 353(2). Re-examining persons who have given clear and consistent testimony conflicts with reasonable time requirements and the immediacy of examining evidence.

In these proceedings, the trial court fully and comprehensively examined the injured party’s and witnesses’ testimony and the expert opinions. The opinions were clear, exhaustive and categorical regarding both the mechanism and causes of the victim’s death and other key circumstances. A participant’s mere disagreement with testimony or expert findings, and unwillingness to accept established facts, cannot legally justify repeated questioning or summoning an expert. A reasoned refusal of applications to question experts or re-examine the injured party and witnesses does not restrict procedural rights or constitute a material breach under Article 412. The right to make an application does not oblige the court to grant every unsubstantiated request.

The panel therefore rejected the defendant’s requests to summon experts, the injured party and witnesses to the cassation hearing. The cassation court is a court of law rather than fact, and questioning those persons and assessing evidence do not fall within its statutory powers.