Cobwebs Grow on Agonizingly Slow Wheels of Turkey’s Creaking Justice Machinery

Nurettin Aytun was a high school student when he was arrested in 1981. Today, at age 25, he is still in prison, awaiting a military court’s verdict in his trial on charges of terrorist killings and bombings.

“My son was held incommunicado for almost two months at the police station and then he got transferred to a military prison where he spent five years in a cell,” said his mother, Leyla.

Aytun is one of the 737 defendants on trial in Ankara for allegedly belonging to the leftist organization Dev-Yol (Revolutionary Road).

Most of the defendants were released on their own recognizance over the last two years, but 64 defendants remain in prison. They face the possibility of execution if the verdict is guilty.

Halit Celenk, one of the lawyers for the Dev-Yol defendants, said the verdict may come next year but the appeals process could stretch the case into the next century. And it’s possible that Aytun and other defendants will remain behind bars all that time.

“Justice so late is no justice,” said Celenk.

In Turkey there is no limit on the time a person may be kept in jail after arrest. In some cases, defendants have been sentenced to terms shorter than time they had already spent waiting for the end of the trial.

Attorney Ercan Kanar calls long trials unjust for those who are eventually acquitted.

For example, Haluk Tosun, a university professor, spent more than three years in jail waiting for the start of his trial, at the end of which he was acquitted.

Ersan Sansal, another lawyer, said the courts do not follow any objective standards in releasing defendants on bail.

“The decisions are taken subjectively by the judges. It is not a fair practice.”

A wave of political terrorism, pitting members of a dozen militant leftist groups against extreme rightists, claimed 5,000 lives in Turkey at the end of last decade.

The turmoil triggered a military takeover in 1980. About 30,000 leftist and rightist terrorist suspects were jailed following a martial law crackdown on extremist groups.

Since then, thousands have been released and dozens of trials have been concluded. But some of the largest mass trials continue.

According to statistics compiled by Turkey’s Human Rights Assn., an independent group, 1,392 terrorist suspects are in prison and still on trial and 2,209 are serving sentences.

Of these, 227 are on Death Row but the Parliament held back approval of carrying out the executions. In Turkey, executions are carried out only after a lengthy legal process that includes parliamentary ratification and confirmation by the president.

One of the largest mass trials involves 1,243 defendants, all accused members of the Dev-Yol organization. In the trial, being held in Istanbul since 1982, the court has heard testimony from 2,000 witnesses. Two months ago defendants finished reading a 3,000-page defense plea. Next, some 200 lawyers will take the floor to sum up the defense.

In the Dev-Yol trial, Celenk said, judges were changed three times in the last six years, slowing down the case as the newly appointed judges took time to study earlier proceedings.

Speeding up mass trials may not serve the cause of justice, however, said lawyer Haluk Turkmen.

The mass trial of 241 suspected Dev-Yol members in the eastern city of Erzincan was finished in 15 months.

“There is an easy explanation for the speed of this trial,” said Turkmen. Defendants were given 15 minutes each for a defense plea. Lawyers protesting the restriction refused to speak.

Lawyers also complain that it takes the lower courts months, sometimes years, to send their opinions to appeals court for study.