The symmetry and asymmetry of human body parts and organs, as well as the proportions of its dimensional characteristics, have been of interest to anatomists, physiologists, physicians and artists since the Middle Ages. In the 19[th] century, criminologists, criminal anthropologists and criminal psychologists started their attempts on identifying consistent links between presence and manifestations of asymmetry and criminal and other antisocial tendencies of individuals. During the same period forensic knowledge of human asymmetries was systematized to develope and refine systems for anthropometric registration of criminals and verbal description of human appearance. The accumulated experience of using human asymmetry data is currently successfully applied in forensic traceological and portrait examinations as well as in forensic medicine. Modern biometric technologies, based on advances in forensic science and anthropology, incorporate data on human anthropometric asymmetries for the purposes of authentication, identification, and biometric searches.

Information on the specific manifestations of asymmetry in anthropometric characteristics and further scientific research into this phenomenon will contribute to the scientific substantiation of the conclusions of forensic examinations conducted to detect incorrect findings of biometric searches when identifying wanted persons as well as to the improvement of modern biometric technologies.

Professor Alexander Romanovich Shlyakhov made a great contribution to the development of the general theory of forensic examination and left a great scientific legacy. The article analyzes his main works concerning subject, method and system of forensic examination, procedural and organizational basis of forensic examination, classification of forensic examinations in terms of general theory of forensic examination. A. R. Shlyakov paid great attention to the training of forensic experts which was also considered in his works. Many of his proposals regarding training of experts remain relevant and some of them were implemented.

Religious studies examination of information materials is a new expert specialty and a relevant area of forensic expert activity. Unlike the state religious expertise, the history and methodology of which is represented in our country by the names of such authors as I.V. Zagrebina, A.V. Pchelintsev, M. Yu. Smirnov, E.S. Elbakyan and others, forensic religious studies examination, actualized by the increased role of social networks, is at the stage of its development and formation of a special range of tasks.

The article focuses on applying the changed range of meanings and beliefs about religion in the context of modern Internet communications. The thesis is expressed about the importance for an expert to take into account certain meanings in religious studies and their changes at the stage of interpreting information materials.

The conclusion is made that most of religious beliefs disseminated in Internet communications are stigmatized. The stigmatization of religious concepts is related to the forms of narrative practices functioning in the Internet environment. It is caused by a number of processes and in particular by the specifics of reproducing historical memories of institutional forms of religion in the past and present. As a result, the stigmatization of religious beliefs is associated with replication of simplified binary oppositions in relation to religion as a whole.

The article substantiates the need for methodological certainty of the data interpretation stage of the examination. It is shown that in the context of religious studies examination of information materials there is a need to identify two components ensuring methodological validity and research impartiality: 1) elements of the ontology of religion and the spectrum of their variability in the digital environment, 2) features characterizing mass religious consciousness in relation to the examined individual preferences and choices. It is concluded that it is exactly the combination that can be considered crucial for establishing criteria for the presence or absence of religious content in the information materials.

The article considers the current state of research aimed at predicting the human phenotypic characteristics based on genetic material. Identification of DNA markers corresponding to certain phenotypes is in demand not only in forensic practices but also in ancient DNA studies. Despite the overall relevance of this field and a large array of publications, research is currently still at its early stage. Bioinformatic analysis of genomic data collected by the scientific community in recent years made it possible to identify the key DNA markers affecting the examined physical characteristics as well as to determine the geography of the alleles. It is noted that the same appearance characteristics in the population of different regions of the world can be determined by different mutations in the ~~same genes which is also relevant when studying the population of Russia. The introduction of modern~~ techniques of whole-genome sequencing and artificial intelligence provides obvious advantages, including obtaining more accurate and practically valuable methods of forensic identification, medical genetics and paleogenetics.

Modern studies in the area of wound ballistics made it possible to establish main damaging factors of a shot, the formation mechanism of a gunshot wound, including temporary cavity dynamics resulting from the kinetic energy transfer from a bullet to biological tissues. However, there is an incorrect use of the term “cavitation” in the scientific literature when describing these processes, which creates terminological ambivalence. The strict definition of cavitation, adopted in hydrodynamics, refers to the phenomenon of the formation of cavities (bubbles) in a liquid medium with a local decrease in pressure below the saturation point caused by high-speed motion of a solid. This physical process is fundamentally different from the mechanism of a temporary cavity formation in a gunshot wound where the main role is played by inertial deformations of tissues rather than the phase transitions of fluid. The use of one term to define heterogeneous phenomena contradicts the principles of scientific terminology, increasing the risk of incorrect data interpretation both in theoretical models and in the applied research. The article provides a comparative analysis of the physical mechanisms underlying cavitation (hydrodynamic context) and the formation of temporary cavities in a gunshot wound. It also systematizes the terminological errors in scientific publications that led to a distorted understanding of the gunshot wound mechanics. The author suggests to exclude using the term «cavitation» in the context of wound ballistics.

This would minimize semantic errors, increase the accuracy of interdisciplinary studies and eliminate methodological contradictions, since terminological rigor is crucial for ensuring reproducibility of examination results and effective interdisciplinary knowledge integration.

The article presents a comprehensive study of the stylistic features of J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” and D. Emets’ “Tanya Grotter and the Magic Contrabass” texts using computational stylometry methods, machine learning and Classic linguistic analysis.

The study aims to provide an objective assessment of stylistic similarity/difference degree between the texts in the context of the legal dispute over plagiarism and parody.

The methodology of examination includes two complementary approaches: quantitative analysis using the Random Forest machine learning model, which allows extracting and evaluating stylistic features based on lexical, morphological, and syntactic text characteristics, and qualitative linguistic analysis focusing on phonetic study of proper names, morphological analysis of nomination structures and pragmatic interpretation of stylistic features. It is demonstrated that the texts by Rowling and Emets have significant stylistic differences identified both through machine learning and traditional linguistic analysis.

The study contributes to the methodology of forensic linguistic and authorship examinations by showing the effectiveness of a comprehensive approach to differentiation between parody and plagiarism in the context of translated literature and parody works.

The article deals with the problem of identifying verbal manipulations at various levels of the Russian language in the context of forensic linguistic examination. The texts of extremist propaganda and terrorist discourses are used as illustrative material. It is shown how verbal manipulations find their manifestation in such texts depending on the language level. It is stated that the participation of an expert psychologist is needed when working with complex cases of speech manipulation. It is noted that the lexical level is the most productive one in terms of reproducing speech manipulations of various etiologies. It is shown how different language levels are mixed when implementing criminal verbal manipulation. The conclusion is made on the scientific and methodological significance of the analysis of the manifestation levels of verbal manipulations, as well as on the influence of such analysis on the evidentiary value of the expert opinion and legal consequences of the expert’s findings.

An undeniable trend in modern scientific and technological development is the integration of artificial intelligence systems into various spheres of human life and activity. Forensic handwriting analysis is also in the focus of scientific community as a potential application area for the related neural networks as evidenced by numerous publications and emerging software products.

However, alongside the attractive prospects of error-free “machine intelligence” use in handwriting examinations, a number of fundamentally important questions arise related to both the specific nature of the primary object of examination the phenomenon of handwriting and the procedural status of a forensic expert in legal proceedings and his expert opinion as a source of evidentiary information in the case. Therefore, this area of scientific and practical knowledge requires not a mere adoption and application of new technologies but rather their in-depth understanding through the prism of scientific and theoretical basics of forensic handwriting analysis and the procedural significance of forensic examination results. Taking into account the above, this paper attempts to provide a competent analysis of the current situation in terms of feasibility of artificial intelligence systems and its technologies application in forensic handwriting examinations.

Based on the approach involving the use of mathematical algorithms for information processing, this article puts forward proposals aimed at supplementing the classification of methods of forensic document examination. In particular, it is proposed to consider the following bases for classifying such methods:

By the information type displayed in a document converted into digital form (digital image of a document): physical-optical methods, frequency-statistical methods, structural-geometric methods, semantic (neural network) methods, clustering methods, metadata analysis methods.

By the analysis level of the information studied, displayed in a document converted into digital form (digital image of a document): low-level methods, medium-level methods, high-level methods. For each of the proposed classification bases the conditions are specified that allow a particular method to be assigned to a specific group. These conditions include, in particular: physical properties of the sensor, photosensitivity indicators, spectrum distribution analysis, object boundary analysis, use of neural networks and other artificial intelligence tools, data clustering features, file service information, etc. The classification of methods presented herein creates the scientific prerequisites for forensic examination of documents in digital form and expands the expert capabilities for solving specific tasks that arise in the course of document examination.

The article examines the problem of forensic ethical assessment of informational materials and acts documented therein in cases of animal cruelty (Article 245 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). The objective difficulty lies in the fact that there is no unified, scientifically based methodology for conducting such an assessment currently. Drawing on court cases, the article demonstrates the consequences of this gap: both judicial decisions remain open to debate regarding the ethical assessment of the case circumstances. As a tool capable of filling this gap, the article proposes the method of axiological situational analysis within the framework of forensic ethics examination.

Axiological situational analysis is defined herein as a method of forensic ethics examination involving reconstruction of value-significant circumstances of a case, their ethical assessment, and comparison with traditional ethical norms and standards embedded in the system of traditional spiritual and moral values, legal acts, codes of professional ethics, and principles of applied ethics prescribed for a given situation or in the exercise of the relevant social role. On the basis of the analysis of the materials of both cases, potential legal and procedural implications of applying specialized forensic ethics knowledge are formulated.

The article discusses the specifics of training expert personnel for government forensic institutions in the context of widespread digitalization. Taking into account the requirements contained in the Article 11 of the Federal Law of the Russian Federation No. 73-FZ dated May 31, 2001 (as amended on July 22, 2024) “On Government Forensic Activity in the Russian Federation”, the author’s position is substantiated with regard to the need to gradually align methodological support of forensic and expert units within various departmental structures which implies changes in their organizational and staffing structure. The article shows the impact of positive and negative aspects of widespread digitalization on the expansion of competence limits of forensic experts, which directly concerns the issues of training expert personnel and their professional retraining. Based on the conducted research, the author gives argumentation for the expediency of developing an integrated methodology for studying objects of digital nature. In terms of strengthening interdepartmental cooperation in the field of expert personnel training, it is also highlighted the importance of forecasting and scientific foresight for further development of the institution of forensic examination and expert practice.