Prova tecnica e contraddittorio nel processo penale

When science and the criminal process come into contact, cognitive mechanisms are set in motion aimed at reorganizing knowledge belonging to worlds other than the legal one. In this context, the actors of the trial scene are forced to move on a hybrid terrain in which judicial epistemology and scientific epistemology mix. Such a fascinating picture pushes the scholar of the criminal process to seek interpretations suitable for explaining the multiple dilemmas that the phenomenon entails. Starting from a historical-legislative excursus of the expert evidence, the proposed analysis examines the different channels through which expert knowledge enters the process, starting from the investigative phase, and reserves a special focus on digital forensics and forensic genetics, to reach the most guaranteed contexts, such as the preliminary hearing and the public trial. Before arriving at the decision control system, the analysis dwells on the evaluation and decision-making moments. It is precisely here that the judge in the presence of the expert, in order to rationally carry out his function of ius dicere, is required to use a language free of lexical ambiguities, thanks to which science and law interact, communicating in a dimension of full awareness of one's own epistemological boundaries.