Admisibilidad de la prueba de referencia en el sistema penal acusatorio bajo los principios de inmediación y contradicción

Abstract

The Constitutional Court of Colombia has repeatedly stated that the right to evidence is a fundamental principle of due process, as is the right of every person to access justice. Its primary importance lies in serving as a vehicle for establishing the truth in a judicial investigation. In criminal matters, there are various means of proof available to judges to support their decisions, one of which is hearsay evidence. This paper aims to examine the admissibility of hearsay evidence, considering the controversy it raises within the Colombian accusatory criminal justice system. It has been argued that hearsay evidence affects the principles of immediacy and adversarial proceedings, as it intensifies the need to establish how this evidence will be evaluated while respecting constitutional guarantees during the evidentiary stage. This prevents these guarantees from being violated during the criminal process, thereby curtailing the parties' right to directly assess statements and interviews received outside of the oral trial. The foregoing leads to questions about the extent to which hearsay evidence can be admitted and what requirements its acceptance entails within criminal proceedings. This question constitutes the central focus of this academic reflection, approached through the analytical-critical research method, considering the main positions regarding the validity of hearsay evidence and its imposed limitations, and opting for an exegetical study of the Constitutional Court's rulings and their implications for evidence in criminal proceedings.