Probative value of the statements of the victim of rape crime. Effects of the repeated hearing

DREPT PENAL ŞI DREPT PROCESUAL PENAL

Abstract

Evidence has no pre-established value, and the assessment of each piece of evidence shall be made by the judicial body or by the court following the examination of all evidence produced, for the purpose of finding the truth. The court order should rely on those evidentiary records corroborated with each other and are able to confirm a clear situation, not being affected by any doubt, no matter the procedural stage during which they were produced, as there were no legal provisions which should confer a higher value to the evidence produced during the stage of the inquiry to the detriment of the evidence produced in the stage of criminal prosecution. There is a normal trend of distortion, of counterfeiting the offence by the minor victim, arising from the kinship relationships with the aggressor, but also from issues related to the victim’s psychology in general, respectively her testimony/position as regards the committed deed could be subject to certain variations, in the sense that at sympathy feelings might emerge for the defendant, who shall be held liable based on her testimony. The repeated hearing has negative effect over the child’s incompletely developed psychic and over his or her subsequent development, and the repeated questions might represent for the minor child that his or her statements are called into question, determining him or her to give desirable answers. Hence, the manner in which the minor intends and is interested in expressing the traumatizing event shall be important, as several times – in this context – the victim receives the special attention of the family, defending the psychological phenomenon hereinafter referred to as “change of role”, leading to the change of the initial behaviour, the minor becoming the instrument of the persons under the authority of whom he or she is and who, sometimes, attempt to distort the facts following the offence whose victim was the minor. Recommendation no. 5 of 2002 of the Committee of Ministers to the Member States regarding the women’s protection against violence requires the Member States to establish certain special conditions for hearing the victims in order to avoid the repetition of testimonies and to reduce the traumatizing effects of procedures, with consequences upon the form of successive statements given in time inclusively.