This is the latest situation in the 'Coup Against the Government' case!...

15 years ago, while the Ergenekon and Balyoz frame-up operations were in full swing, Journalist-Author Barış Terkoğlu published a literally historic photograph on Odatv. This was a photo of the judges, prosecutors, and police officers who were conducting those frame-up operations meeting at an iftar dinner.

The headline was “These photos will cause a stir.” And it did, but in this way:

4 months later, an operation was launched against Odatv, and almost its entire staff was detained and arrested for Ergenekon. Fake documents allegedly belonging to the organization had been planted on all of our computers. Arrest was not enough; the judges, prosecutors, and police officers in the photo also filed a lawsuit against Barış Terkoğlu on charges of “targeting individuals who have served in counter-terrorism.”

According to the then-Minister of Justice Sadullah Ergin; it was “an extremely normal situation for judges, prosecutors, and police officers to eat together and chat in a crowded environment in front of everyone,” and “a human relationship.”

When the AKP-Cemaat partnership broke down, it emerged that these cases, opened with the claim of a “coup against the government,” were frame-ups; thousands of judges, prosecutors, and police officers, especially those in the photo, were dismissed from their professions, arrested, or fled.

The photograph was also called “the red-handed evidence of the deepest frame-up in the history of Turkish justice.”

NO IFTAR, BUT WHATSAPP

The reason we are remembering this event from 15 years ago is the investigation and trial regarding the Ayhan Bora Kaplan organized crime group, which was at the top of the country's agenda a year ago but is now almost never mentioned.

It was alleged that the operation was carried out by the team of the newly appointed Minister of Interior, Ali Yerlikaya, against the former Minister, Süleyman Soylu.

It turned out that the most important secret witness of the investigation and trial, codenamed M7 Serdar Sertçelik, had fled abroad while under house arrest. In statements he made from abroad, Sertçelik claimed that the Organized Crime Department (KOM) police officers asked him to name people such as “Bekir Bozdağ, Süleyman Soylu, Fahrettin Koca, Hasan Doğan, and Mücahit Aslan.”

Following this development, the KOM police officers were first suspended and then arrested.

After this, the political bazaar was also stirred up. MHP Leader Devlet Bahçeli described the operation as a “coup against the MHP, AKP, and the People's Alliance,” and said, “It is seen that ignoble and crypto gangs nested within the police and judiciary are once again making calculations over Turkey... Whoever protects and serves the search to shadow the national will that has manifested and the frame-up of smearing honorable names with secret witness statements is a traitor, a hashshashin; the extensions of the police, judiciary, and media must be dealt with.”

Currently, the trials of both the KOM police officers and the Ayhan Bora Kaplan organization are ongoing. The trial of Bora Kaplan, for whom two life sentences, one of them aggravated, are requested on the grounds that he is the leader of the organization, seems to have reached its end.

Documents have entered the file in the police officers' case that are unbelievable.

For example, as the results of the examination of digital materials arrived; it was seen that the KOM police officers, until they were removed from duty, not only communicated with the prosecutor conducting the investigation but also wrote countless times via WhatsApp with the President of the 32nd High Criminal Court, which was conducting the trial, effectively continuing to conduct the investigation and, in the words of the defense attorneys, “directing the court.”

A transition from the iftar dinner photo that shook the country 15 years ago to the era of WhatsApp correspondence, which is explained as “a requirement of the ex officio investigation”!..

But no one seems to care.

THEY EVEN FORMED A GROUP

Something new has emerged in the police officers' case file.

It turns out that for the Ayhan Bora Kaplan case, the Deputy Chief Public Prosecutor, the investigation prosecutor, some other prosecutors, and KOM police officers had also formed a WhatsApp group on the grounds of “fast information exchange, preventing unnecessary correspondence and reminders, and accelerating procedures.”

Let us share just two of the hundreds of messages in this WhatsApp group due to their relevance to the course of the trial. The prosecutor conducting the investigation says in a message dated November 10, 2023:

“According to the provisions of the law, intelligence information and secret witness statements cannot be taken as the basis for a verdict on their own; they must be supported by other evidence.”

As is known, there are two secret witnesses in the Bora Kaplan case; or rather, there were. One of them is Serdar Sertçelik, codenamed M7, who is also a defendant in the case, and the other is codenamed Ü5. Sertçelik fled abroad and exposed himself. Ü5 also withdrew from being a secret witness. But the Prosecutor, in his final opinion, took the statements of both secret witnesses into account and requested the punishment of the defendants.

'WE WOULD BE EMBARRASSED IF ASKED BY THE PRESIDENCY'

First, let us recall the situation of Serdar Sertçelik. According to what is told; while he was under house arrest and wearing an electronic ankle monitor, he went out on November 20 and went to a tripe restaurant. He was shot there. He was treated at the hospital. A report was obtained from the doctor stating that “there is no objection to him being taken into custody.” He fled on November 27. He is still in prison in Hungary, where he was caught.

Now let us look at the correspondence on the subject in that WhatsApp group established by the prosecutors and police.

On November 21, at 14:14 and 18:28, the Deputy Chief Public Prosecutor wrote the following:

“Information has been received that there was an armed conflict in a branch of the Köroğlu tripe restaurant and that 3 people from the ABK team were injured, is this true?.. Friends, it is very important both by law and for you not to be in a difficult situation that you report important events concerning our file and its parties to me or our prosecutors without delay. The secret witness of the file was shot in some way, but 3 days have passed and we have no news! If asked by the Ministry, the HSK, or the Presidency, we will be embarrassed by saying we have no news. We learned about the event today when we heard it by chance and asked you. 5 hours later, Cevheri Güven published it, meaning if we hadn't learned it by chance, we would have learned about an event concerning our own file from the fugitive FETÖ member Cevheri, which is unacceptable.”

The Deputy Branch Manager of KOM also replied at 18:32; “Mr. Chief Prosecutor, there was a delay due to the chaos. We will act more sensitively.”

On November 25 at 13:45, the prosecutor conducting the investigation said the following:

“No answer has been given yet regarding this writ. In the letter written by the Probation Directorate, they informed us that they determined that the person violated the judicial control in the form of house arrest more than once; that the excuse was found justified once; however, the excuse was not found justified in other violations, and they are waiting for an answer as to whether the measure will continue. On the other hand, TCK 220/5 has accepted the provision that organization leaders are responsible as perpetrators for all crimes committed within the framework of organizational activities. Let us carry out the issues regarding judicial control in this writ until the day the suspect will be brought ready with other suspects, both in terms of whether the measure will continue and in terms of determining the referral status within the scope of TCK 220/5. On the other hand, it must be meticulously investigated whether the crime committed against him was committed within the scope of the organization. Accepting that the crime was not committed within the scope of the organization by taking only the suspect's statements into account would not be a correct investigation method... The crime committed against this person must be meticulously investigated; it should be asked from intelligence agencies whether the suspects have communication with people who have organizational status in our file; the signal partnerships and communication traffic of the suspects' GSM lines should be examined based on them. After all research methods are exhausted, if there is no organizational action, the event will not be included in our file. Research on this event is important for this reason. In another dimension, if something happens to this person in the future, what was done and what was not done regarding this injury event will inevitably be examined. Let us do our job soundly, good luck.”

Let us return to the trial. The Prosecutor's Office informed the court in January that Serdar Sertçelik could not come to the hearing because he was abroad and had been removed from the Witness Protection Program.

Despite this, in the hearing that started last April, the Court President questioned the defendants based on his statement. After the SEGBİS recording was turned off, he explained the letter sent by the Prosecutor's Office and said that they forgot to process it into UYAP.

The latest developments regarding Sertçelik are as follows:

First; an attorney to whom he gave power of attorney requested to participate in the Bora Kaplan case heard at the 32nd High Criminal Court three days ago. The attorney submitted Serdar Sertçelik's petition stating, “I do not want my statement, which was taken under pressure and by force, to be taken as the basis for the verdict,” along with almost all the documents in the case file where the police officers are being tried. Thus, information and documents regarding Serdar Sertçelik entered the Bora Kaplan case officially for the first time.

THE STATEMENT OF THE DOCTOR WHO GAVE THE REPORT

The second development; the statement of Dr. R.E.Ş., who gave the report stating “There is no objection to him being taken into custody” after Serdar Sertçelik was shot within the scope of the case where the police officers are being tried, was taken.

In a previous article, we stated that it was understood from the WhatsApp correspondence that the prosecutor conducting the investigation gave the instruction to the KOM police officers regarding this. Let us come to the statement of Dr. R.E.Ş. In summary, he explained the following:

“I discharged him on the 20th. On November 24, two or three people who said they were police officers by showing their IDs came to me. They said that there was a detention decision given by the Prosecutor's Office regarding Serdar Sertçelik, and that information was requested by the prosecutor's office as to whether there was any objection to him being taken into custody in his current state... I replied to the incoming police officers that I was an assistant physician and that it would be correct for a forensic medicine specialist or an emergency medicine specialist to decide on whether there was any objection to the person being taken into custody. However, the incoming police officers said that they needed a report urgently because they had two hours, that the person was already under house arrest and under their supervision, that the Prosecutor was aware of the situation, and that it would not cause me any legal trouble if I gave the report. They even added, 'The Prosecutor is also aware, we don't want to take this person into custody much either.' Upon this, since there were official state police officers in front of me and they stated that the matter was urgent, I wrote my own evaluation note by hand on the consultation form and stamped and signed it. I had not put any phrase regarding the person being taken into custody in my first handwritten note. However, 1 hour later, the same police officers came to me again and said, 'Teacher, we want you to add the phrase 'there is no objection to him being taken into custody' here too.' They did not return the consultation form with my first handwritten note to me. That form remained with the police. They stated that I needed to take a new consultation form printout and write a handwritten note on it again. I took a new printout and wrote a note on the form by hand from the very beginning. This time, in line with what the police wanted, I also wrote the extra phrase 'there is a medical objection to him being taken into custody.' Subsequently, the police took this form from me and left the department where I worked.”

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE SECOND SECRET WITNESS?

Let us come to the situation of the second secret witness, codenamed Ü5, which is the basis of the case and the accusations directed at the defendants.

In the trial that started last April; while it was expected that Ü5 would be heard by changing his voice and image; the Court President announced that they heard Ü5 in a special session upon the warning of the Police Witness Protection Branch Directorate that an attempt was made to decipher Ü5's identity, that the images of this hearing would be given to the lawyers who requested them, and that if they had questions, they would direct them to the witness between sessions if they reported them in writing.

However, a short time later, Ü5 withdrew his statement with the claim that it was “taken under duress and pressure.” The Court President also said that his statement was invalid because he withdrew from being a witness and that there was no need for cross-examination. Despite this, the Prosecutor, in his final opinion, took Ü5's statements as a basis and requested the punishment of the defendants.

After that, the following happened:

Ü5 first filed a criminal complaint with a long petition to the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's Office against the KOM police officers, claiming that they forced him to become a secret witness.

Then, on November 4, he applied to the 32nd High Criminal Court, where Bora Kaplan is being tried, and requested to be heard as a witness. The Court, which held a special session the next day, decided that a copy of Ü5's petition should be placed in the Court's safe, and the original should be sent to the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's Office for the appreciation and execution of the necessary actions, on the grounds that “even if he is removed from the scope of witness protection, he has an obligation to comply with confidentiality.”

The allegation is that; the Court President reacted to Ü5 by saying, “Don't stir things up, mind your own business,” and did not want to take his petition; he had to take it upon the Prosecutor's warning that “You have to take it.”

In short; although these and other important developments took place in the case, which occupied the agenda for a long time and was even described as a “coup against the government,” it has reached the decision stage.

In the case with 61 defendants, 17 of whom are under arrest, which has been going on for 7 months, the decision was expected to be announced last week, but the defenses were prolonged. The Court President stated that he wanted to hold a hearing on the weekend and go to a decision.

What is not understood and is wondered about is the reason for this haste.

Is there political pressure?.. Is there a fear that other scandals will emerge through the police officers' digital materials?.. Is the result of this case being awaited to decide the fate of the dismissed KOM police officers?.. Or is a second operation related to this case in question?..

Müyesser YILDIZ

November 29, 2024