Dink Family Attorneys Demand Thorough Investigation
Fri, Apr 30 2010
By:Armenian Weekly
On April 28, the legal representatives of the Dink family submitted a
petition to the Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office and requested the
office to appoint prosecutors who would thoroughly investigate the
Hrant Dink murder process which is proved to be a three-year long
"operation" through the legal cases, investigations and inquiries
conducted until today. The lawyers also requested that the appointed
prosecutors should allocate most of their time to this investigation.
Attorney Fethiye Cetin said, "The prosecutor or prosecutors who will
be appointed to this investigation should be released from other
duties and attending hearings, because the acts we mentioned in our
petition covers a period of more than three years, the number of
individuals and institutions involved is quite high thus require an
intensified concentration and time. This is why we requested from the
office that prosecutors should be mainly focusing to this
investigation to conduct it timely and thoroughly, as one should not
expect a satisfactory work from them with their existing workload."
The petition lays out the course of murder in phases of "preparation",
"creating public opinion", "act" and "manipulation", "destroying
evidence" after the murder. The lawyers said, "It is imperative to
collect all the evidence, bringing loose pieces together to see the
whole picture to reveal this extremely professional structure, to take
all the clues into consideration to decipher this organization, to
find the material facts and to conduct an effective investigation."
The elements of the preparation phase is described in the petition as
news made by the media to turn the public opinion against Hrant Dink,
official complaints against him with identical petitions and the
indictments prepared against him without having any legal grounds.
The members of the National Intelligence Service (MIT), The
Intelligence services of the Gendermarie and the Police are mentioned
as being part of this phase, as they had not taken any preventative
measures although they had been closely following the course and the
triggermen at the time.
The petition describes in detail the acts of all phases, naming the
murder itself as the "acting" phase, the efforts to draw the public
attention away from the murder through official statements and leaking
the details of the investigation to the media as the "manipulation"
phase and finally spoiling and destroying the evidence and preparing
forged documents as the last phase.
Attached is the full petition.
OFFICE OF ISTANBUL PUBLIC PROSECUTOR
(with the authority of Article 250 of Turkish Penal Code)
APPLICANT : Rahil Dink, Delal Dink, Arat Dink, Hosrof Dink
REPRESENTATIVES : Av. Fethiye Çetin – Av. Ý.Cem Halavurt
SUBJECT : Hrant Dink cinayeti soruþturmasýnda görevlendirilecek savcýlar hk.
DESCRIPTION :
1-) The undisputable fact, revealed in the light of judicial
proceedings continue at the Istanbul 14th Heavy Criminal Court, file
no 2007/428, and Trabzon 2nd Megistrate Court, file no 2008-615, the
report prepared by the inspectors of the Prime Ministry’s Inspection
Council and the inquiries of the inspectors of the Ministry of
Interior, is that the murder of Hrant Dink is an act organized and
conducted as a multi-phase operation by a professional organization.
2-) This course of action consists of phases which can be named as
"preparation", "creating public opinion", "action", post-murder
"manipulation" and "destroying and forging evidence" and covers a
period of more than three years.
3-) The preparation phase consists of: making Hrant Dink a target,
publishing news to create a public opinion against him, making him the
subject of articles by the columnists, putting him as a target in the
public opinion by submitting official complaints against him by
identical petitions, preparing indictments against him although there
was no legal grounds or the claimed act did not fit into any defined
crime and unlawful convictions against him. Hrant Dink was tried to be
isolated and become a subject of hate and it was almost impossible to
publish stories, create public opinion in favor of him and even ensure
he faces a fair trial .
It is worth noting that the National Intelligence Service (MIT), The
Intelligence of Gendermarie and Police Forces have been accomplice to
the murder of Hrant Dink and facilitating the murder by taking no
preventative measures although they had been following the process and
the triggermen closely.
4-) The "action" phase is of course the commiting the murder followed
by the "manipulation" phase during which the efforts to divert the
attention away from the murder, has begun. The statements of
Celalettin Cerrah (the then head of Istanbul police forces) , the
efforts to boost the speculations in the media that the murder was an
act of the diaspora, leaking the details of the investigation to the
media, thus causing the evidence to be destroyed and hidden, and
efforts to justify the murder even after Hrant Dink was killed should
be considered as parts of this phase. Destroying, losing very
important evidence and forge documents are essential parts of te
murder plan.
It is imperative to collect all the evidence, to bring loose pieces
together in order to see the whole picture, to expose this extremely
professional structure, to take all the clues into consideration with
the aim of dechiphering this organization, to find the material facts
and to conduct an effective investigation.
Therefore, the triggermen of the Hrant Dink murder and the ones who
made him a target and isolated him, the media people who are
instigators to the crime through thier writings and news, some
particular judiciary people and public officers who, by failing to
act, facilitated the crime should be assesed together and their roles
in the crime and their relations with the organization should be
investigated. The organization which acted in accordance with its plan
and committed the crime following each step one after another can only
be identified by all these acts are thoroughly investigated.
Right after the Istanbul 14th Heavy Criminal Court approved the
indictment of the case file no 2007/428, there have been many
developments regarding the officials of Istanbul and Trabzon Police
Directorates and Trabzon Gendermarie Forces related with the case as
well as directly associated with the content of the case. However the
prosecutor’s office did not act upon any of them. Many documents,
information and witness statements that were included in the file
signals that the security personnel working in the mentioned
institutions are instigators, accomplice or facilitators in the
conduct of the act. Therefore the case file should be assessed
thoroughly to be able to bring the crimes committed by these officials
and their relations with the organization in full length.
There hasn’t been any work or in depth study on the claims and the
evidence that exist in the case file -file no 2010/146- at the
Istanbul 12th Heavy Criminal Court and known as the Cage Action Plan.
Although they are parts of the same issue, each incident is being
investigated or prosecuted separately and having no interrelation.
The case should be looked into with a view of establishing links
between the incidents in the light of evidence gathered through
looking into all the events occured throughout this course. Otherwise
it will be impossible to uncover all the people and factors of the
organization that are behind the curtains. If the prosecutions
proceed as such, it will not satisfy the conscience of neither the
victims nor the public andthe murder case not be considered as fully
uncovered.
5-) Looking at the characteristics of the incidents detailed in the
attached document it can be seen that all acts are committed with the
same ideological objective by an organization that denies anything but
their social and political views and punishes the ethnic and
religious groups by using violent means and thus creates a climate of
fear and intimidation over dissidents.
6-) For the above explained reasons, we submitted a 16-page petition
to the court during the hearing of the case file 2007/428 on February
8, 2010 at the Istanbul 14th Heavy Criminal Court . The petition
highlights all the phases of Hrant Dink murder and points the
institutions and people that had an active role in the crime . Basing
on these we requested the court to examine all the acts explained in
detail should be considered as a whole and all the responsible be
brought to justice.
7-) Istanbul 14th Heavy Criminal Court accepted our request in its
interim decision no.26 and ordered a warrant be written to Chief
Prosecutors Office, asking for the necessary steps to be taken; the 15
page petition be attached to the warrant. The warrant explaining the
interim decision and our petition is sent to the Prosecutors Office.
However it is obvious that in order to conduct the investigation
efficiently and thoroughly, the Office would need prosecutors who will
dedciate his time and energy only to this case.
As will be seen in the petition attached, the prosecutor or
prosecutors who will be appointed to this investigation should be
released from other duties and attending hearings, because the acts we
mentioned in our petition covers a period of more than three years,
the number of individuals and institutions involved is quite high thus
require an intensified concentration and time. One should not expect a
timely and thorough work from the prosecutors who already have a heavy
workload.
RESULT : For the reasons explained above, we request that prosecutors
who would allocate most of their time to the Hrant Dink murder plan to
be assigned and that no further case or duty be given to these
prosecutors. 28.04.2010
Lawyers
Av. Fethiye Çetin Av. Ýsmail Cem Halavurt