Standard of Proof and Russian Procedure Law: Unknown or Well-Known?

Abstract

Though Russian legal science discusses the need to introduce standards of proof in procedural branches of law, different branches of Russian procedural law (civil procedure, sports disputes procedure, criminal procedure) do not directly refer to the standards of proof used. However, this does not mean that this procedural law ignores the doctrine of standard of proof. For the constitution of standards of proof used is either the (1) indirect normative indication of the standard or (2) exemplary decisions of higher courts, sports arbitration. It is necessary to move from indirect, actual use in favor of normatively fixed and defined standard at the level of relevant legal acts. However, there is also a formal obstacle. At all branches of Russian procedural law, the judge (arbitrator) has the right to evaluate evidence freely, according to his inner conviction. This postulate is a twoway street; proving in many ways becomes a subjective procedure with an often not very obvious result for the parties to the dispute. There is also no uniformity within the framework of the procedural branches, which are identical in their legal nature. The branches of civil procedure and sports disputes procedure are private law, but in fact the standards of proof used in them are different. Criminal procedure, as a public branch of legal procedure, uses the strictest standard of beyond reasonable doubt in the trial itself, but resorts to a different standard for resolving issues