The article considers one of the elements of evaluating evidence in criminal proceedings — reliability. The reliability is revealed by the example of an expert opinion as an independent evidence in a criminal trial. The author of the article has developed criteria for assessing the reliability of the expert’s opinion, studied the main approaches to the concept of reliability in the theory of criminal procedure. The object of the conducted research is public relations related to the assessment of the expert’s opinion for its reliability. The purpose of the study is to analyze approaches to the concept of reliability in criminal proceedings, as well as to develop criteria for the reliability of an expert’s opinion. Of the methods used in the study, a dialectical method based on the knowledge of social and legal reality should be singled out separately. The following general scientific methods were used: analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction. Among the private scientific ones: sociological (when conducting a survey), mathematical (when processing data obtained from the results of the survey), systemic (when studying the place and role of reliability in the system of elements of evidence assessment), as well as the axiological method of scientific research.
evidence, the process of proof, evaluation of evidence, reliability, expert opinion
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