This article examines the problems associated with defining the concept of a justified verdict, its relationship with the properties of legality and motivation of a court decision. The conclusion is formulated that modern judicial practice has actually turned the property of the validity of a sentence into an appendage of legality. Violation of the norms of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, in turn, is a universal basis for canceling or changing a court decision. Thus, in the practice of appellate courts, the identification of violations of the law committed by the court of first instance, as a rule, precedes the verification of issues of the validity of the verdict, which the court may generally leave without consideration, and the cassation courts, contrary to the requirements of the law, actually verify the validity of the verdict. In this case, the sentence is canceled (changed) due to a legal basis (the only legal one, according to the letter of the law) significant violations of the criminal and (or) criminal procedural law. The authors associates the appearance of such collisions with the confusion in judicial practice and in procedural science of the concepts of legality, validity and motivation of a sentence. However, such a mixture directly contradicts the requirement of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, which distinguishes the subject of appeal (legality, validity and fairness of the sentence) and cassation (literally according to the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation — only the legality of the sentence) proceedings. Based on the results of the study, the authors proposed her own vision of the content of the concepts of legality, validity and motivation of a court decision, and their significance in rendering a legal verdict. Key words: sentence, properties of the sentence, legality, validity, motivation.