Those who touch it get burned... A 'Fund' shackle for a female shopkeeper too!..

The fund scandal has turned into a process where almost everyone who touches it gets burned.

First, journalists Murat Ağırel and İsmail Saymaz were summoned to testify after voicing allegations made by a deputy from the New Party. Both were released with a travel ban and a signature requirement. However, upon the prosecutor's objection, they were placed under house arrest with electronic shackles. Ağırel was later arrested in a file related to the Sarıgül family due to a report he did not write.

Simultaneously, Sözcü editor Mustafa Balcı and journalist Şaban Sevinç were arrested simply for sharing a photo of an individual mentioned in the fund investigation with an AKP figure.

Likewise, journalist Bahadır Özgür was detained due to reports on the fund scandal; fortunately, he was released with a travel ban and a signature requirement.

Finally, an investigation was opened against journalist Ardan Zentürk for the crime of “insulting the President” due to his posts about the fund.

“While I Couldn't Even Buy Boots for My Child”

These are what we know and hear. Who knows what else is happening that we don't know or hear about.

We will tell you about one of them.

In the days when Murat Ağırel and İsmail Saymaz were punished with house arrest, and Şaban Sevinç and Mustafa Balcı were arrested, the police raided the home of a 64-year-old woman, a primary school graduate who lived alone in one of Ankara's districts. They were looking for her daughter. They asked where she was. She said she had married years ago and settled in Ankara. The mother, frightened by the sight of so many police officers, thought her daughter had committed murder and asked, “What crime did she commit?” From the police's answer, she only understood the “insulting the President” part. They showed the search warrant they had. She was surprised when the police she invited inside looked under the pillows and into the drawers; she asked, “Is my daughter going to fit in a drawer?”

She must not have believed the “insulting the President” accusation in response to this search, because after the police left, she asked her daughter, whom she called, whether she had killed someone.

It was Saturday. She waited at home through Sunday, but no one came. On Monday morning, she went and opened her shop. A short while later, the owner of her old shop called and said the police had come and were looking for her. While she was talking to him, another number called, so she hung up and answered that number.

The caller was the police; they said, “We are in front of your door, your child is crying. Don't let her cry anymore, come as soon as possible.”

The woman was frantic. Because her child was only 2.5 years old and had epilepsy. She went home in 10 minutes. When she arrived, the police had already started searching. As soon as she entered, her phone was confiscated. After she barely managed to send her crying child upstairs with her nanny, she asked what her crime was. The answer given was “insulting the President” and “inciting the public to hatred and hostility.”

During the search, two old mobile phones, a wedding CD, and a hard drive were confiscated. Then, she was taken to the police station in three police vehicles.

She learned what she was accused of there, after the printouts of three posts related to the fund scandal arrived.

The posts that were the subject of the accusation were as follows:

While retweeting a comment by a figure in the pro-government media that the fund incident was a “FETÖ operation,” she had written, “We are tired of the FETÖ, Ergenekon, PKK, foreign powers talk. You got caught while stealing the money.”...

Again, in response to a figure in the pro-government media calling Fatma Betül Sayan Kaya “from Doğubeyazıt,” she had replied, “No, she is from Seydikemer, Muğla, and the daughter of a very poor family,” because she knew their villages were very close.

In another post, she had said, “You deposit money into a fund to buy a house, but others come and steal your money.”

According to the account of the female shopkeeper who was a suspect; even the police stated that there was nothing to these posts when they read them, and they even wrote her statement themselves with an emphasis on “freedom of expression, a constitutional right.”

Entered via “Fund,” Exited via Posts from 3-5 Years Ago

The woman was taken to the Prosecutor's Office on the same day. In her statement, after stating that the social media account belonged to her and that she had made those posts herself, she noted the following:

“Although I have re-examined all my posts, I could not see any post that would incite the public to hatred and hostility or contain insults to anyone. People are showing their reactions on many social media platforms regarding the fund incident that has been on our country's agenda recently. I think that many orphans have rights to the amount of money mentioned in the fund incident. As a citizen, I was extremely disturbed by this. The posts made by me and other citizens are posts we made for the purpose of criticizing the issues we see, hear, and learn about in the press. With these posts, no one is inciting anyone to hatred and hostility; on the contrary, the people who cause such incidents affect our sense of justice and conscience. I am a shopkeeper. Believe me, I couldn't even buy boots for my child even though winter has come. When we see such news while we are in this situation, we are inevitably negatively affected. I think it is our most natural right to criticize this issue without harming anyone and without offending anyone. There are no words in any of my posts that specifically contain insults to the President.”

The statement lasted a total of 15 minutes.

Again, according to the suspect's claim; the prosecutor also stated that there was nothing to these, but told them to go outside and wait.

During the wait, her lawyer said, “This is not a good sign,” and they saw the prosecutor go in and out several times with a mobile phone in his hand.

During the waiting process, which lasted about four hours, they were called inside and sent back out three times.

In that process, this time, three posts she made between 2021-2023 were placed in front of the woman and she was asked about them. While the woman was answering all of them, she said, “These have nothing to do with the posts about the fund currently in your file. If the posts I made in the past were a crime, an investigation would have been opened against me at that time.”

Her lawyer also emphasized that the investigation was based on the police's research reports under the name of virtual patrol, but that the Constitutional Court had canceled this regulation, therefore the procedure was unlawful, and the posts were merely expressions of opinion regarding the country's agenda.

“Assumptions” That Did and Did Not Make It into the Record

These are what made it into the record during the prosecutor's interrogation. There are also dialogues and events that did not.

For example; while answering about her post from 2021, when she mentioned the attitude of the police, the prosecutor reacted by saying, “Our police would not do that,” to which the woman pointed out the words of the police who came to her house regarding her child. When the prosecutor did not believe her, she said that there was a baby camera in the house that recorded audio everywhere and that she could have it brought. The prosecutor, who watched the recordings brought upon his approval, commented, “There is a misunderstanding.”

According to another claim, when the prosecutor's phone kept receiving notifications during the interrogation, the woman's lawyer asked, “Who are you taking orders from?” The prosecutor was content with replying, “Let's not get scolded.”

Ultimately; after the statement, which was completed in three or five parts, the woman was referred to the duty magistrate judge with the accusation of “publicly inciting the public to hatred and hostility” and a request for house arrest.

According to the suspect's side, a dialogue like this, which was not reflected in the record, took place there as well:

As soon as the lawyer entered, he asked the judge, “What did this woman do? Who gave the order for us to come here?” The judge said, “There is no such thing. I will not put these assumptions into the record.”

But the lawyer's following statement did make it into the record:

“The statement process at the Prosecutor's Office was completed at 17.30. Later, the prosecutor called us again and said, 'we are asked to ask these as well,' and an addition was made to the statement.”

As for the other details of the statement; while the woman asked to be released by saying, “My child is an epilepsy patient. I am a shopkeeper; I have contracts and collections,” her lawyer said that although there was an accusation of insulting the President in the search-seizure, detention, and other investigation documents, nothing was asked about it, and furthermore, they did not understand which act was considered “inciting the public to hatred and hostility.”

However, the judge, with the “conviction that it would be proportionate according to the nature of the crime attributed to the suspect and the current state of evidence,” decided on house arrest for the woman for 1 month, and a judicial control decision of signing once a week thereafter.

As soon as she went home, an electronic shackle was attached to this shopkeeper woman's leg, and the police started coming to check every day.

Let us end with the irony made by her friends who were aware of her situation:

“Are you Murat Ağırel or İsmail Saymaz that you were placed under house arrest?!”

Müyesser YILDIZ

October 26, 2026