Rabia Çetin
An Istanbul court on Friday once again adjourned a defamation and insult trial involving nine journalists and one co-defendant, with no verdict issued after a brief hearing lasting about 15 minutes.
The 13th hearing in the case was held at Istanbul’s 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance. The defendants—including journalists Barış Terkoğlu, Barış Pehlivan, Can Bursalı, Nevzat Çiçek, Doğan Akın, Gökmen Karadağ, Ayşenur Arslan, Fatih Portakal and Can Özçelik, along with Mustafa Kılıç—did not attend, but their lawyers were present.
The case stems from a complaint filed by Mustafa Doğan İnal, a former lawyer for President Tayyip Erdoğan, who had accused the journalists of “insult” and “defamation.” However, İnal withdrew his complaint at the previous hearing.
During Friday’s session, which began about 30 minutes late, the court was informed that one of the defendants, Mustafa Kılıç, had died in the interim. His lawyer told the court that Kılıç had initially filed a criminal complaint over the alleged leaking of audio recordings but later became a defendant himself, and had left the country during the process. The lawyer said Kılıç died of a heart attack abroad and requested the case be dropped with respect to him.
Lawyers for other defendants reiterated calls for acquittal. Fatih Portakal’s lawyer argued that his client was being prosecuted simply for interviewing the author of a widely discussed book, while Nevzat Çiçek’s lawyer also requested acquittal.
The judge ruled to abandon a previous decision to re-hear defendant Ayşenur Arslan and postponed the case to Oct. 27 at 2 p.m., instructing the prosecutor to prepare a final opinion on the merits.
The case is linked to the 2020 book “Metastaz 2: Cendere,” authored by Terkoğlu and Pehlivan, which included allegations that members of the judiciary were bribed and that courts were interfered with. The claims were based on an alleged audio recording said to have been made داخل a courthouse.
Following the book’s publication, İnal filed both criminal complaints and civil lawsuits against several journalists, alleging damage to his reputation. The criminal case initially targeted a smaller group of journalists but was later expanded through the merger of related cases.
Separately, a 300,000-lira ($...) non-pecuniary damages lawsuit filed by İnal against Can Bursalı, Barış Terkoğlu and the news outlet Independent Türkçe was previously dismissed by an Istanbul civil court.
