In this paper there are firstly some general observations about stress (the concept of stress, stressors, stress responses, consequences of stress). Then, the author examines the effect of stress on giving testimony, that is on two most important psychic functions of the importance for giving testimony: perception and memory. The impact of stress, on perception is discussed in the framework of the importance of affective tone of perception. The lower doses of stress can improve attention and perception, but with intense stress, attention rapidly decreases. Stress often causes erroneous perception of time and other errors in observation and can lead to illusions and hallucinations. The errors in face recognition are also possible in view of 'the phenomenon of focusing attention on weapon '. In relationship with memory, the author firstly gives some general considerations about this function. Then follows brief overview of memory for emotionally colored events. The negative influence of stress on memory is reflected in the possibility of psychogenic amnesia, which are often the escort of psychological trauma. Further, some events will be remembered with a lot of gaps, distortions and overemphasis. The paper points to a number of studies on (in)accuracies and (in)complete memories for traumatic events. Summarizing the main results of these studies it is concluded that memory for traumatic events has similar sharacteristics as memory for normal, nontraumatic events. Memory for traumatic events also follows the same cognitive principles. In that sense, both traumatic and nontraumatic memories can be equally powerful on the one hand, and on the other hand, there may be gaps or errors in memory as well as for the positive and negative life events.

The subject of this article is the category of especially vulnerable witnesses in criminal procedure. The article is divided into sixth parts. The first part offers a review of various definitions of especially vulnerable witnesses in comparative law. The second focuses on the procedural protection of especially vulnerable witnesses in Serbian legislation. The third is concerned with the tactical rules of questioning of especially vulnerable witnesses. In the fourth part the author points to the importance of special services for providing assistance and support to especially vulnerable witnesses. The fifth part presents similarities and differences between protection of especially vulnerable witnesses and other forms of witness protection. The sixth part reflects on conclusions.

The article points to the discordance of the new 2011 CPC with other regulations of our judicial system: The Constitution, practices of the European Court of Human Rights, Criminal Code, Law on Public Prosecution, Law on Police, Law on Contracts and Torts. On the other hand, the laws which have not yet been terminologically or essentially harmonized with the new CPC are presented. All these are sources of discord in our legal system and require introducing changes to the CPC.

In this paper, the author defines the notion and explains the penal order procedure and its general characteristics. It is one of the special simplified criminal proceedings, which has got special basis and special structure. This procedural form is ultimately aimed at the rationalization of the criminal procedure. It is achieved by avoiding the main hearing in the trial proceeding. The author presents the evolution of the penal order in Serbia from 2001 to 2011. He points to some legal innovations in this field during that decennium. He compares old and new legal provisions about penal order and finds some differences. There is a constant tendency to expanding the area of criminal offences which can be judged in this procedural form. New legal provisions are, in general, better than previous. However, the practice has shown that application of penal order is too small. The previous practice does not live up to expectations of theory and legislator.

This article is dedicated to the illegally gathered evidence in Serbian criminal trial. The paper consists of three parts: 1) the general theory of admissibility of illegally gathered evidence; 2) rules of admissibility of evidence in relation to violation of the right to privacy; 3) rules of admissibility of evidence in relation to illegal interrogations. There is also conclusion. There are four aspects from which those problems are reviewed: constitutional rules, statutory rules, court jurisprudence and law theory.