Istanbul Police Chief Cerrah: The Untouchable Of Hrant Dink Murder Case

The eight people, including Istanbul Police Chief Celalettin Cerrah and Intelligence Branch Director Ahmet İlhan Güler, who are thought to be at fault in Hrant Dink’s murder, will not be taken to the court for not taking seriously the warnings regarding Yasin Hayal’s plans about murdering Hrant Dink.

The decision by the Istanbul Regional Administrative Court on June 27, which represents the end result of the preliminary investigation by the inspectors of the Ministry of Interior, anticipates there will be no investigation against Istanbul Police Department. The final deciison was one paragraph and without any explanation of the legal ground behind the decision.

Administrative process is over; prosecutor’s investigation is still continuing

Even though the inspectors were able to gather much information and the experts came across many clues that show some officials were responsible for what happened, the Regional Administrative Court decided that the officials were not to be investigated.

Dink’s lawyers had filed a criminal complaint with Istanbul’s Office of the Chief Prosecutor against Celalettin Cerrah and other officials for “negligence resulting in death” on January 17, 2008.

When the prosecutor of Istanbul sent the file to the prosecutor of Fatih in Istanbul, the latter took the statements of the Dink family on April 4. Nothing else happened after this.

Dink Family objected; Cerrah was not touched

After Hrant Dink was murdered, the civil service inspectors from the Ministry of Interior had conducted a preliminary investigation and Istanbul Governorship had decided to permit the investigation of Ahmet İlhan Güler.

After Güler objected the decision, Istanbul Regional Administrative Court overruled the decision, demanding expert report and the completion of the missing parts in the investigation.

Following this decision, a second preliminary investigation was conducted and the decision was again an investigation against Güler. Upon another objection, another preliminary investigation was conducted and another expert report was prepared.  

In the last (third) investigation, the inspectors decided it was necessary to grant permission for the investigation of Celalettin Güler, Bülent Köksal, Chief of the Office of the Intelligence Branch İbrahim Pala, Section Chief Şevki Eldivan, Desk Chief Volkan Akbulak and police officers Bahadır Tekin and Özcan Özkan. However, Istanbul Governor chose to grant permission for all of the names above except Celalettin Cerrah and Bülent Köksal. .

Then, when those who were investigated and the Dink family objected, the file came again to the Regional Administrative Court. The court rejected Dink family’s objection to the governor’s decision to keep Cerrah and Köksal out of the investigation.

Finally, the Regional Administrative Court decided on June 27 that the police officers of the Istanbul Police Department had no fault in the murder and therefore there was no need to grant permission for their investigation. (EÖ/EZÖ/TB)