Doubt in Favour of the Defendant, Guilty Beyond Reasonable Doubt of criminal legislation. For example, the jurisprudence considers that ambush homicide is not a homicide committed in a sly manner, which would be an aggravating feature of the offense. Even though such a perception is in favour of the defendant, it is not the result of the court’s application of the in dubio pro reo principle, but the interpretation of the term “in the sly manner” as the feature of the offense. If the court uses circumstantial (indirect) evidence to substantiate decisive facts then in dubio pro reo can apply in cases where there is either insufficient number of indications (deficiency of indications) or when the probative value of indications does not allow for a reliable conclusion (the unreliability of indications). Both situations are elaborated by the Supreme Court of Croatia below: However, all of the prosecutor’s statements don’t cast a doubt on the correctness of the decision of the Court of first instance according to which it was not proven that the accused committed the crime he is charged with because the presented evidence still leave doubt as to the possibility that someone other than the accused found cocaine held in gutter of the house. Prosecutor’s claims in the appeal are indications that indeed point to the accused as the most suspicious person, but still he was not the only person who possibly could have left the drugs in that gutter. Therefore, since these indications together with the other evidence presented still leave open the possibility that another person held the seized cocaine in the gutter of the house, which the First instance court took into consideration, the accused should indeed have been acquitted, applying the in dubio pro reo principle.332 and: In conclusion, it should be noted that, given the absence of necessary evidence which would undoubtedly point to the participation of the accused in this otherwise utterly abhorrent crime, the results of the procedure in fact are reduced to the existence of certain clues, which don’t have the necessary quality to be considered solid grounds for a guilty verdict, so in respect of the in dubio pro reo principle the accused should be acquitted from charges for the crime, as was done by the Court of first instance333. Regarding the application of the rule in dubio pro reo in connection with indications, it is worth to mention the research done by Davor Krapac on direct and indirect evidence in criminal proceedings, which comes to the conclusion that courts were more frequently in doubt and applied the rule in dubio pro reo in those criminal cases in which the indictment was based on indications than in cases where the indictment was based on direct evidence.334 Supreme Court of Croatia, Judgment no. I Kž-38/99-3 23.11.2000. Supreme Court of Croatia, Judgment I Kž-479/97, 01.06.2000. 334 Davor Krapac, Neposredni I posredni dokazi u krivicnom postupku (Direct and indirect evidence in criminal proceedings), Informator, Zagreb, 1982, p. 122 332 333 76