Family of dead prisoner seeks justice after months
ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News
Five convicted prisoners were killed when a police van transferring them to Istanbul burst into flames in the Kayseri province in September 2011. AA photo
Authorities have yet to launch any criminal trial into the circumstances surrounding an inmate transport truck that burst into flames last August, killing five prisoners inside, the cousin of one of the dead men has said.“Six months have passed since the incident; there is no investigation into anybody and no case has yet been filed about the incident. And we haven’t received any psychological or social help, support or compensation from the state yet. We want the people who are responsible for this to be found and punished,” Ercan Evin, the cousin of 33-year-old inmate İsmet Evin, told the Hürriyet Daily News in an interview Jan. 30.
“An administrative investigation regarding the faults of the officials in the case should have been already completed, but we haven’t seen any improvement either in the administrative investigation, or in the criminal investigation. We can see that the whole case has been neglected,” Selçuk Kozağaçlı, chairman of the Contemporary Lawyers’ Association (ÇHD), told the Daily News yesterday.
The five convicted prisoners were killed when a police van transferring them to Istanbul burst into flames in the Central Anatolian province of Kayseri’s Pınarbaşı district on Aug. 12, 2011. The prisoners became trapped inside the burning vehicle when officials were unable to unlock the van’s doors due to the blaze.
Letter to President Gül
Ercan Evin said İsmet Evin’s wife, Vesile Evin, had written a letter to President Abdullah Gül after the incident and asked that an investigation into the incident be made and that the people responsible for the deaths be sentenced.
“We asked the president to get directly involved in the matter, but we received a letter from the Presidency saying that our letter was being transferred to the justice minister,” Ercan Evin said.
İsmet Evin, who was a father of two, had been looking after his own family, as well as his brother Mustafa Evin’s family, before he was arrested and perished in the flames, Ercan Evin said. Mustafa Evin had also been in prison for six years, Ercan Evin added.“Now both families are miserable,” he said.
Zübeyir Evin, the dead man’s brother, had pleaded for humanity to be shown to the families left behind.
“I would like to call upon President Gül and ask him to forgive my brother. We lost one brother, please at least give our other brother back to us. These families have nowhere to go,” Evin said.
