Message from Ece Güner: 'He told me the best story'

Lawyer Ece Güner, who was arrested as part of the investigation into the Ahbap Association, used striking expressions regarding Haluk Levent in a message she sent to the public from prison.

Defending that she did not commit any crime, Güner stated, "I did not make a penny of profit from this business. On the contrary, I suffered for a year, experienced stress, and had to start taking antidepressant medication again. I only, and only, trusted Haluk Levent, who was heroized in those days as an 'angel of goodness'."

"I had never encountered anyone as good at telling stories and as convincing as Haluk Levent," Güner said, continuing: "I suppose that is the common trait of great con artists: convincing even the smartest people."

The full text of Güner's message is as follows:

“YOU HAVE CANCER!”

Only those who have heard this word at least once in their lives can judge my naivety and my emotional fragility.

When you hear those words, your world collapses in an instant.

My first thought, I never forget, was this: “I won't be able to see my son get married, I won't be able to love my grandchildren...”

I cried for hours. Then the struggle began.

My first surgery (double mastectomy) lasted 9 hours. What great pain! I was given morphine for days to endure it. I hated it; it caused terrible nightmares.

Then I lived for months with 2 pumps in my 2 breasts; I was draining blood from my breasts every few hours.

My mother would help me at my bedside, may God bless her, and then she would cry in a corner after every blood-draining session. Then I had 2 more surgeries: my ovaries and uterus were completely removed.

Then the treatment process began again. It is still ongoing, I am still using cancer medication. (My oncologist reports are available.)

During this process, since some of my lymph nodes were also removed, my immune system was quite weak and at risk. As a matter of fact, I was hospitalized for 2 weeks with pneumonia.

Around the same time, my divorce process with my husband began. The illness and severe trauma must have played a part.

If I remember correctly, it was the end of 2022; my divorce was finalized in December 2022.

In 2022, I couldn't leave the house for months.

I had to receive intensive psychological support and use antidepressant medication.

Due to the severe stress and anxiety Haluk Levent caused me during my struggle to get my money back, the need for antidepressant medication recurred, and I am still using it today. My psychiatrist, Prof. Dr. Yankı Yazgan, and my psychologist, Şeyma Doğramacı, are the closest witnesses to all these processes I have experienced. They are also the closest witnesses to the devastating stress I lived through until I got my money back...

Returning to the end of 2022... My traumatic divorce process ended. In February 2023, the terrible Maraş earthquakes occurred.

I am a person who has humbly tried to be helpful. It is said that the left hand should not know what the right hand gives, but since my current situation is a deprivation of liberty caused by a well-intentioned donation, I feel the need to make some explanations.

Throughout my life, I have tried to help my family, my employees, and even those who asked for help from me, even if I knew them very little. I used to make regular donations to many associations. Among these are associations and foundations such as the Turkish Foundation for the Disabled, UNICEF, LÖSEV, and unfortunately, AHBAP.

When helping people and associations around me, I always think: “Donating this amount won't bankrupt me, but it can make significant contributions to many people's lives...”

I have never been a person of thousand-dollar shoes, dresses, or jewelry, but I have always tried to make donations, some small and some large, without blinking an eye; I am grateful for this even in the situation I am in today.

Because this is what I saw from my family. Throughout every period of my life, I paid all my taxes down to the last penny; I received plaques for being a tax record-holder for years. I achieved everything I could by working day and night.

My belief has always been this; taxes are one thing, Zakat is another. I should give my Zakat directly to people. As a matter of fact, “Zakat” is one of the words most emphasized among acts of worship in the Quran.

Another belief that I have kept in mind throughout my life is: “People who come into life very lucky—like me—should help those who are less fortunate.”

It saddens me greatly to put all of this into writing, but due to the process I am going through, I am unfortunately forced to explain these things...

Yes, I am one of those who came into life lucky. I was born into a relatively wealthy, respected, and well-educated family consisting of good people. I grew up in France; I graduated from Paris Sorbonne first in my class of 2000 French students.

I speak French and English at a native level and German at a good level. I have 4 books published to date.

Returning to my family, my late grandfather, Ömer Ülkü, was a very respected and honest prosecutor and judge. He was from the Menteşoğlu family of Muğla. My late great-grandfather, Beyazıt Gün Güner, was one of Atatürk's comrades-in-arms; he was a gendarmerie commander and originally a Rumelian from Konya.

On my father's side, all the men in the family are soldiers, and on my mother's side, almost all the children are lawyers or judges.

From these clean, moral people, I learned honesty above all else.

Unfortunately, evil has surrounded everything so much that people have become accustomed to seeing only evil. No one believes that a person is trying to be, or can be, “just a good person”!

Yes, I am known as a successful lawyer; of course, I have a certain intelligence. For example, I had a great career in the international arena; I even served as an arbitrator within the ICC International Court of Arbitration, but my intelligence does not work in the direction of cunning! Unfortunately, if it is the right term, I have no “street smarts”! Since I never saw such wrong behaviors in my family, I didn't understand when I encountered them!

My dear mother and father are METU graduates. My father was a high-level international director at the Council of Europe for years. That is why I grew up in France.

My father was like a spiritual son to the late Turgut Özal. He served as both Chief Advisor and Chief of Staff to Özal. Later, he was an ANAP İstanbul deputy. He is the most honest, principled, and best person I have ever known. He is 85 years old and suffers from a severe heart condition; as I write these lines in prison, he is the only one I worry about. I pray for his heart to endure the pain and injustice.

I also pray to hug my son again soon, to smell his hair. My life, my everything, my son is the kindest-hearted person in the world.

Prison conditions and even what the world thinks of me are not important at all because God knows my innocence and my heart. But I am ashamed before my son. How could I be so naive! Why am I making him experience these pains: this is my main devastation!

Now let's get to the main point. But first, I had to explain myself, what I have been through, that is, what kind of person I am; so that you can understand...

I am 57 years old, and it seems that I had never encountered a truly bad and lying person until I was 54, as if I were a servant God loves! (I have always read a lot, worked a lot, but I guess I grew up in “cotton wool”) I return to my first sentence: “YOU HAVE CANCER!” and I repeat: please do not judge my state of mind, my emotional fragility, and my high empathy, those who have never heard this sentence in their lives.

A few months after the double severe trauma I experienced (cancer surgeries, treatment, and my divorce), the earthquakes of the century occurred, and my heart was shattered.

Because I couldn't fully recover, I felt the guilty conscience of not being able to go to the region. I was always seeing Haluk Levent on television and social media. I was very impressed by his selfless work. I was thinking: “This person is a real angel”

At that time, there were heavy donations to Ahbap on social media; I also made a large donation. I made one of the highest donations. Afterwards (I think around April-early May 2023), Haluk Levent reached out to me and said he definitely wanted to thank me in person. He had called after my previous donations, but I had always refused. After the earthquake, I finally accepted.

He came to my office in Levent with a huge bouquet of flowers in his hand. He constantly complimented me, saying, “You are so kind-hearted, you are a wonderful person.”

One evening in May 2023, Haluk Levent came to the house where I live with my mother and father. He gave a morale concert at home with his guitar for my mother, father, brother, and son.

In those sad days, this gave me great morale. Then he invited my brother and me to his concerts, sat us in the front row, came and sang songs to us at the concert, etc.

After such a dark period, for the first time in my life, I had cheered up a little.

At the same time; from the first day he came to my office, he asked for loans with various stories (I explained the stories in detail to the police and the prosecutor's office).

In summary, Haluk Levent was saying: “I am Ahbap's biggest donor. I have donated a total of 9 million Dollars to Ahbap to date. We are having temporary difficulties in such and such projects. The relevant businessman's money is temporarily blocked and will be released at the end of the month. If you lend me money for a very short term of 1 month, I will donate it to Ahbap, and then when the businessman's money is released, I will pay you back immediately anyway,” he said. (I am not going into details to avoid making the text even longer; I explained everything to the prosecutor's office)

To make a long story short, he asked for 3 million Dollars; I said, “Impossible, I don't have such money.” He played on my “conscience” a lot, told dozens of stories of kindness.

I was so “caught in the middle” in terms of conscience that I stayed in the hospital for 3 days in the summer of 2023: at Acıbadem Maslak with a 40-degree fever. In the end, I said I would give 1 million Dollars, but that I was looking for a house; I specifically warned him that I wanted to buy a house to live in with this money and that it should not exceed 1 month.

“I am Haluk Levent. I am chosen as the most reliable person in Turkey in public opinion polls every year. All of Turkey trusts me, how can you not trust me? This is a grave insult to me. Worst case scenario, Plan B, if the businessman's money is not released, I will give 10 concerts, make an advertising deal, and I will still pay my debt,” he would say. In the following weeks, he increased the loan I gave to the point of abuse to 1 million 570 thousand Dollars using the same method.

All the transfers I made were also made from my legal bank account at İş Bankası with the note “so many TL in exchange for Dollar debt”.

I made the payments to the IBANs of three people Haluk Levent gave me; because it was Haluk Levent, I didn't suspect anything. He said he always did it this way.

The debt that returned to me after 1 year of intense struggle was also made to my bank account with the record of “debt repayment” from individuals.

I gave the debt to Haluk Levent as a Dollar debt, and the money I received on a Dollar basis was slightly less than the money I gave.

It was slightly higher in TL; I didn't even pay attention to that because I had given my debt in Dollars; besides, if I had put that money in KKM (Currency Protected Deposit) for a year, I would have received many times more!

In summary; I gave a loan to Haluk Levent, and he made me suffer for a year. Every week he was telling a new long story to avoid paying, talking about health problems. I felt sorry for him, I gave him more time.

At the end of a year, in the summer of 2024, I opened up to my uncle, lawyer Togay Ülkü. He had a very harsh conversation with Haluk Levent. “If you don't pay our debt, we will go to the prosecutor's office,” he said. Upon this, Haluk Levent paid his debt within a few weeks. At that time, we thought: “It means he went through a difficult period but he is not a con artist. He paid his debt.”

Upon this, with the advice of my family, I blocked Haluk Levent on my phone and never met with him again!

So, my acquaintance was only for one year, and almost all of it was spent trying to recover my money.

I have had no contact for exactly two years! As far as I understand, Ahbap's controversial transactions took place after 2025.

I had never encountered anyone as good at telling stories and as convincing as Haluk Levent. I suppose that is the common trait of great con artists: convincing even the smartest people.

Be careful, all the people, including me, whose emotions he abused, have experienced a major trauma in their lives. For example, the businessman who lost his daughter, me—cancer and divorce. Also, the women I talked to in the detention center while I was in custody and whom I met for the first time in my life; their lives were successful/wealthy, but they all had the same common characteristics. The victim profile is as follows; 1) most are women, 2) all are lonely women, 3) all have experienced certain traumas in their lives and are emotionally susceptible to abuse, and note: all have lived or are still living abroad for many years. For example, I didn't know Haluk Levent had been in prison because I grew up in France.

The other woman who gave a lot of money and whom I talked to in the detention center also came from abroad; that is, like me, she is “French” to many facts!

As a result, to summarize:

I did not make a penny of profit from this business.

On the contrary, I suffered for 1 year, experienced stress, and had to start taking antidepressant medication again.

I only, and only, TRUSTED Haluk Levent, who was heroized in those days as an “angel of goodness”!

Also, I said it on the first day, and I repeat; I have never been the lawyer or consultant for the Ahbap Association or Haluk Levent. I have never had any interest or connection with the association's affairs.

I accept all criticisms; I was naive, I admit. But I did not commit any crime!

I was naive with my legal money that I earned by working day and night for 30 years, for which I submitted all tax records!

I also submitted my income and tax records between 2000-2024 to the prosecutor's office.

My good intentions and high sense of pity have been abused. But I only understand this now.

I want to think this: I, who thought Haluk Levent really had a side that did good (he probably did many favors, and I hope he did!). But at the same time, I think he also had a dark side.

If I had known this dark side, let alone donating 1 lira to Ahbap or lending 1 lira to Haluk Levent, I wouldn't even have walked down the same street! It's that clear.

I wish those who knew all this in 2023 had written more! I wish such a person had never been given the right to manage an association!

In my opinion, by learning a lesson from this story, all parties should jointly prepare an urgent legal regulation.

Associations and association managers should never be allowed to be in management if they have a criminal record; audits should be carried out more intensively and in more detail. Transparency should be taken to a higher level.

And a lesson for all of us; we should not immediately heroize someone blindly!

I have learned a lot from this for my own part. The most important lesson I learned: “A tailor really cannot mend his own tear!”

But I know one thing for sure: I AM INNOCENT!

I did not commit any crime.

I embrace you all with love and respect. I am praying for justice."

AHBAP INVESTIGATION

In the investigation conducted by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office, proceedings were initiated against Haluk Levent, the founder of the Ahbap Association, on charges of "establishing an organization for the purpose of committing a crime," "laundering assets derived from crime," and "opposition to the Tax Procedure Law and the Law on Associations."

The Chief Public Prosecutor's Office announced that it is investigating allegations that high-amount money transfers were made from Ahbap Association accounts to the accounts of some suspects, in line with MASAK reports and technical and physical surveillance studies within the scope of the investigation.

The file also included allegations that Haluk Levent made high-amount transactions on legal betting platforms between 2020-2026 and that money was transferred from Ahbap Association accounts to the account of Yeliz Kaya, who is claimed to be his assistant.

Lawyer Ece Güner, who was detained as part of the investigation, argues that the money transfers in question took place within the scope of a debt relationship.

On the other hand, the assets of the association and some suspects within the scope of the investigation were seized.