Good faith and reasonableness as limits of rights in criminal proceedings

Human rights and freedoms are the supreme values guaranteed by the state. For the purpose of implementing this constitutional provision in the course of criminal proceedings, the state vests their participants with a wide range of rights. However, while realizing his/her rights, each participant of criminal proceedings can act in his/her illegal, immoral interests and do harm to other participants, society and the state. In law such a behavior is called the abuse of right and is inadmissible. In order to prevent the negative consequences of the abuse of right, legislators establish the limits of rights. The limits in this case imply the boundaries of the right within which a person is free to choose the options for his/her own behavior. The article deals with such limits of rights as good faith and reasonableness. It has been noted that the content of the above concepts is ambiguous, because of its evaluative nature and connection with the categories of morality and ethic. The article cites several opinions on the essence of good faith. First, good faith means the desire of a person for legality, public safety, morality of his/her behavior. Second, it is a strict observation of legal regulations by all participants. Third, good faith has both an objective and subjective meaning. In the objective sense, this phenomenon is the proper use of rights and freedoms, in the subjective sense good faith is the innocent participant's delusion regarding the illegality of his/her own conduct. Moreover, the article differentiates the concepts of good faith and innocence, indicates the independence of these categories. Having analyzed the foreign and Russian legislation, the author developed her own definition of good faith as a limit of right. The article notes reasonableness as one more limit of the rights. The article deals with the objective and subjective sense of this phenomenon. Reasonableness is a respective criterion, measure for evaluation of the participant's behavior and the person's attitude to his/her own actions and their consequences. The article emphasizes that the right's limits in criminal proceedings have certain features. Firstly, the presumption of good faith and reasonableness of the participant's behavior in the course of criminal proceedings should be taken into account. Secondly, it is up to the relevant government bodies and officials to prove the violations of these limits. In order to overcome the excessive discretion of power in solving this issue, the article proposes the objective criteria of good faith and reasonableness. The author believes that such a normative regulation will promote the unimpeded realization of rights by all the subjects and encourage a normal functioning of criminal proceedings.

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