The solution of disputable issues on the facts of road accidents requires the use of special technical knowledge covering a set of interactive elements of which the road traffic process consists as whole.
In most cases, the consideration of case of the given category in the courts is possible only after a forensic auto and technical expertise. Indisputable is that fact that the effectiveness of considering such cases directly depends on the timely conduction of auto and technical research.
Experts of Kyiv Scientific Research Institutes of Forensic Expertise carry out forensic auto-technical expertise at a high professional level – a kind of forensic engineering-transport expertise, the essence of which is an expert research and the establishment of the accident mechanism and its circumstances, the technical condition of the vehicle and the road. The case materials, including individual versions are exposed to the investigation, as well as the results of the inspection of the scene and the vehicle, traces on them, the vehicle itself, their parts, assemblies, units, systems, the actions of the participants of the road accident and other output data.
The subject of auto-technical expertise is the actual data on the technical condition of the vehicle, the road situation at the scene, the actions of the participants of the accident and their possibilities, including individual versions of the road accident participants, the mechanism of the road accident, etc.
General objects of auto-technical expertise can be vehicles (their details, knots, mechanisms, systems, and fragments), the road, the place of an accident etc. The objects of certain types of auto-technical expertise can be more specified.
In accordance with the order of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine “On Approval of the Instruction on the appointment and conduct of forensic examinations and expert research and scientific and methodological recommendations on the preparation and appointment of forensic examinations and expert studies” the main tasks of the auto-technical expertise are the following:
- the establishment of failures of means of transport (hereinafter referred to as vehicles), which threatened the safety of traffic, the reasons for their formation and the time of occurrence (before the road accident (hereinafter referred to as the accident) or as a result of or after it), the possibility of detecting a malfunction by the methods of monitoring technical state of the vehicle; the determination of the mechanism of the influence of the malfunction on the occurrence and development of the accident;
- the establishment of mechanism of the road accident and its elements: the speed of movement (in the presence of traces of brakes and damages), length of brake and stopping paths, the trajectory of movement, the distance travelled by the vehicle for certain periods of time and other spatial and dynamic characteristics of the accident;
- the establishment of the conformity of actions of the driver of vehicle in the given road situation to the technical requirements of the Traffic Code, the presence of the technical possibility to prevent the accident from the moment of danger, the technical compliance of the driver requirements of the Traffic Code as well as the establishment of causal link between the actions of the driver and road accidents.
- The approximate list of issues to be addressed:
- What malfunctions had the system (mechanism, knot, one unit) of the given vehicle according to the Traffic Code to the technical condition of the vehicle?
- Are there any malfunctions in the vehicle under research that could be the technical cause of the road accident?
- When were discovered malfunctions with regard to the moment of the road accident?
- What the reason for failure of this mechanism, system (steering, braking system, etc.) of the vehicle?
- Was the driver able to detect a malfunction before the accident?
- Did the driver have the technical ability to prevent the use of the malfunction?
- It should be noted that auto experts of Kyiv Scientific Research Institute also help with other tasks and issues, the solution of which is related to the research of the technical condition of the vehicle, the road situation and actions of the road accident participants.
More detailed information about all types of research, please see the section expert activity.
