Concept, signs and types of newly discovered and other new circumstances in criminal proceedings

Resumption of proceedings in a criminal case due to new or newly discovered circumstances, being an independent stage of criminal proceedings, by its purpose and content acts as a procedural mechanism complementing other ways of ensuring legality and fairness of verdicts and other judicial decisions and elimination of judicial errors. The legislator in the criminal procedural law has provided for new and newly discovered circumstances as grounds for resumption of proceedings in a case. The study of the relevant criminal procedural norms conducted in the article shows that the wording of the legislator is not sufficiently unambiguous. Resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation No.43 of December14, 2021 «On application by courts of Chapter 49 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, regulating the resumption of criminal proceedings in view of new or newly discovered circumstances on the conclusion of the prosecutor», explaining the peculiarities of the implementation of the institute of review of a criminal case due to new or newly discovered circumstances, contains an expansive interpretation of the provisions of Parts 3 and 5 of Article 413 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, which also does not allow to clearly distinguish between new and other newly discovered circumstances. Characteristics of newly discovered and other new circumstances formulated by the authors enable to conclude about their identity and the need to amend the criminal procedural law.