Rule of law in criminal procedural evidence: methodology and practice of application

The paper develops an integrated methodology for applying the rule of law to criminal-procedural evidence under martial-law conditions and rapid digitalization. The rule of law is treated as a procedural algorithm implemented through evidentiary filters that ensure legality, verifiability and sufficiency of the evidentiary set. Building on this framework, an Evidence Passport–an attribution-and-registration module–accompanies a digital artefact from acquisition to trial (origin, technical parameters, hashes, timestamps, access logs, and options for independent verification). The methodology fuses CPC/ECHR standards with ISO/ENFSI/NIST/Berkeley guidance, translating multi-sensor analysis into admissible procedural form. The practical section outlines workflows for images, audio, geospatial tracks, connection logs and metadata, and illustrates them with micro-cases (critical infrastructure strike; entrapment; messaging verification). The approach increases the predictability of judicial decisions and balances efficiency with human-rights protection, providing a usable toolkit for judges, prosecutors and defence counsel.

rule of law; criminal procedural evidence; digital evidence; evidentiary filters; proportionality; digital data chain of custody; martial law