Police Officers Who Allowed Ogün Samast Pictures Reach Media Are On Trial

The trial of the two police officers who had their picture taken with Ogün Samast, Hrant Dink’s murder suspect, right after he was caught will be held today (July 9). This was a picture decorated with a Turkish flag with a sentence on it that said “Motherland is sacred; it cannot be left to its destiny.”

The court will deliberate over the request by Dink’s lawyer that Samsun’s 4^th Criminal Court of First Instance should not only hear the testimonies of those witnesses picked by Samsun Police Department, but all the witnesses who were on duty on that day.

Lawyers want to see the images from the teahouse where the pictures were taken

Moreover, the court will decide whether or not the images in custody should be turn over to the lawyers representing Dink’s case.

Samsun Public Prosecutor had filed a lawsuit not because so many police officers had their pictures taken with Samast on January 20, 2007, but because the pictures were taken at the teahouse at the Department of Fight Against Terror (TEM) rather than at the detention center of the police department and they appeared in the media.  

The prosecutor asked for six months to two year prison sentence for Metin Balta, TEM’s acting branch director, for “misconduct in office” as he allowed the picture takings on January 20 and for one to five year prison sentence for police chief İbrahim Fırat for “violating the secrecy of the investigation as he let suspect’s pictures reach the media.”

Those who posed were not tried, the objection was rejected

The court rejected the demand by Dink’s lawyers that the other culprits in Samsun Gendarmerie and the Police Department who had their picture taken with Ogün Samast be tried as well.

Moreover, the court rejected the demand that Balta and Fırat’s case be combined with Dink’s murder trial. (EÖ/TB)