AMED
Kemal Kurkut was a university student who was murdered during the Newroz celebrations in 2017 by an invading, murdering Turkish police officer named Yakup Ş. The murderer of young Kemal has walked free after being acquited of murder with intent in the 7th trial, held at Amed High Criminal Court.
During the trial, the murderer and his lawyer were present. The hearing was attended by Kurkut’s mother Secan and his brother Ferhat Kurkut, along with his lawyers Mehmet Emin Aktar and Sidar Avşar.
Additionally, Fahriye Yıldırım, the mother of Medeni Yıldırım who was also killed as a result of fire opened by soldiers during a protest in Lice, and HDP deputies Züleyha Gülüm, Serpil Kemalbay and Saliha Aydeniz attended.
Intensive security measures were taken in front of the courthouse and in the corridor where the trial room was connected to. As part of attempts to intimidate, the occupying Turkish police officers deliberately sat right next to Kurkut’s mother Secan and his brother Ferhat. After people waiting to attend the hearing were searched, they were taken into the court room. 20 Occupying police officers also attended the hearing in solidarity of their murdering colleague.
While citizens entered the courthouse from the entrance gate, it drew attention that the murderer police Yakup entered the courthouse with the judges, from the judge entrance.
The court stated that the report requested from the General Assembly of the Istanbul Forensic Medicine Institute (ATK) had not been received, while Mehmet Emin Aktar, the lawyer of the Kurkut family, stated that the current evidence and files were in the hands of the ATK. Lawyer Mehmet demanded the arrest of the murderer which the court rejected on the grounds that there was no possibility of obscuring the evidence, so the hearing was adjourned to 14 January 2020.
After the decision of the court, mother Secan Kurkut reacted to the defendant and his lawyer by shouting “Killers”. Mother Kurkut was taken out of the courtroom by the Turkish police.
HDP Izmir deputy Serpil Kemalbay, who made a statement in front of the court after the hearing, said: “The defendant is on trial without arrest for 7 hearings. He walks by us, waving. The prisons are full of people, people are thrown to prison because they send a Tweet, but the police who killed Kemal are wandering among us. Again we face an impunity. Justice is being killed once more and we want the law to be fulfilled in order to prevent this from happening.”
