TURKISH COURT ACQUITS POLICEMEN POSING WITH DINK MURDERER
PanARMENIAN.Net
23.10.2008 15:40 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Two senior police officers charged with negligence
over the leaked photos of police and gendarmerie officers posing with
the man suspected of murdering Agos editor Hrant Dink were found not
guilty yesterday, Anatolia News Agency reports.
‘Souvenir photos’ with suspect is not a crime, the court decided.
Ultra-nationalist teenager Ogun Samast gunned down Dink outside his
newspaper office in Istanbul on Jan. 19, 2007 and was captured by
the gendarmerie on his way back to his hometown of Trabzon on the
Black Sea.
The murder of Dink, who was tried under article 301 of the Turkish
Penal Code, caused serious domestic and international criticism.
The photos of the suspect with police and gendarmerie officers appeared
in the media, causing a huge embarrassment for the department.
Two senior police officers were charged with dereliction of duty by
allowing the photos to be taken and then leaked to the media and
causing the public to believe the department sympathized with the
murder suspect.
The court said there was no evidence the charged officers were
responsible for the leak and found both defendants not guilty.