POLICE SHOOTING

Ferhat Gerçek was shot at by the police when he distributed the "Yürüyüş" ('march') magazine 2 years ago. He was injured in his back and is bound to a wheelchair ever since. At the time of the incident Gerçek was 17 years old.

The third hearing of the case took place on 2 October at the Bakırköy 9^th High Criminal Court in Istanbul. Gerçek is paralyzed as a result of the bullet that hit him on 7 October 2007. 7 police officers are on trial. Defendants Cengiz Çalış, Yavuz Özer, Aydın Özdere, Hasan Bayraktar, Emre Taşkın, Can Koçbülbül and Muzaffer Ünal face up to 10 years and 6 months imprisonment.

In the same court case Gerçek himself is trialed under charges of "opposing the law on meetings and demonstrations, resistance to preventing him from doing his duty, insult of public officials and damaging public property", facing imprisonment of up to 15 years.

According to information from Gerçek's lawyer Taylan Tanay, the court had asked for the radio records of the day Gerçek was shot at, but these records do not exist anymore. The court was informed that the police keeps that kind of records for 1 year the most, thus they have been deleted last year on 7 October.

Tanay argued: "If the prosecutor had initially got hold of the records, we would have them now".

Gerçek being trialed under "economic" aspects

Tanay claimed that concrete allegations against Gerçek do not exist and that he had been identified as a defendant only because he filed a complaint against the police. The lawyer requested to separate Gercek's file and Gercek to be acquitted. The court rejected Tanay's requests on the grounds of "judiciary economics". Tanay responded: "The child who is the victim is continued to be trialed as a defender. So what about the principles of a fair trial?"

Gerçek's lawyers requested to directly interrogate 2 police officers after they had learned that their statements had been taken in an interim session. The lawyers' request was rejected by the court.

The lawyers also claimed to detain the 2 police officers that declared that they had shot. According to information from Tanay, the prosecutor replied that there is "no need for that right now" and the court rejected this request as well.

The case is to be continued on 12 Feburary 2010. (TK/VK)