Impeachment Evidence And Its Use In Criminal Proceedings

Testimonial evidence plays a crucial role in the discovery of the truth, while cross-examination of the court session has a great significance for identifying the authenticity and falsity of the testimony of witnesses. Cross-examination which is to protect criminal defendants' right to confrontation develops a institution of questioning the witnesses. The impeachment of the credibility of witnesses exists in cross-examination, especially in anti-asking process. Judicial practice have no knowledge of the concept and use of impeachment evidence, Foreign laws, particularly the U.S. law is cited by theorists while discussing the impeachment evidence. However, the concept of impeachment evidence and its use in criminal proceeding is helpful to display the function of impeachment evidence, discover the facts and achieve the procedural justice.The role of impeachment is usually to argue the probative force of testimony, to prove a witness deliberate lies, witness cognition, unreliable memory and incorrect statements in fact. The so-called impeachment evidence is used to attack the credibility of a witness. It can obtain the questioned witnesses by cross-examination of witnesses, other ways also can do. The former is called the internal evidence, the later is named after circumstantial evidence. Impeachment evidence exists mainly in the following five forms: prior inconsistent statements, bias evidence, character evidence, witness perception or the defect and specific conflict of mental. It is not difficult to find lots of problems in our criminal proceedings by inductive inference on existing laws and regulations and analysis of specific cases, when the judge, prosecutor and defendant make use of impeachment evidence, such as: the confusion between impeachment evidence and substantial evidence; misuse of impeachment evidence; the impeachment among written testimonies in case of absent witnesses; the limited impeachment role of character evidence; the imperfect use of the regulations of impeachment evidence and the related system; formalization in impeachment between the prosecutor and the defendant, and so on. Impeachment evidence plays such a little role that it can not effectively reveal the incredibility of witness testimony. That is not conducive to the realization of procedural justice, but also detrimental to the discovery of the truth.Today when the trial mode is increasing the competitive factors, the problem of arguing the probative force of testimony is gradually concerned. So it is necessary to construct the rules of impeachment based on foreign experiences. We also should be concerned about the related institutions of impeachment evidence, in addition to the specific provisions of "the Federal Rules of Evidence" and Common Law, when investigating that of the U.S rules. We should know: the use of impeachment evidence is based on cross-examination system; attendance of witnesses is the premise of impeachment; disclosure of evidence is the security for effective impeachment and justice; defense counsel is an effective booster for impeachment.The basic ideas of constructing impeachment evidence institution is to distinct between impeachment evidence and substantial evidence, conform to China's judicial practice, meet the minimum procedural justice and avoid unnecessary delay in the proceedings. Specifically, we should explicit the concept of impeachment evidence, the competence of impeachment evidence and its forms displayed; provides internal evidence, the sequence and the relevant restrictions used in circumstantial evidence; provide the limited admissibility of impeachment evidence; prevent the misuse of impeachment evidence, and improve the relevant institutions as much as possible.