Top Turkish court approves former Police Chief Hanefi Avcı's sentence

Toygun Atilla ANKARA

Former Chief of Police Hanefi Avcı.

Turkey’s Supreme Court of Appeals has approved a five-year sentence for former Chief of Police Hanefi Avcı on charges of aiding the outlawed armed Revolutionary Headquarters terror organization in a case into the purported leftist group.

The Court of Appeals approved the sentence of five years and 7.5 months after amending the sentence of five years for Avcı on charges of “possessing and carrying full and semi-automatic unlicensed weapons that can be fatal.”

Avcı was sentenced to 15 years in jail for his book, titled “Haliç’te Yaşayan Simonlar: Dün Devlet Bugün Cemaat” (Devoted Residents of Haliç: Yesterday, State, Today, Religious Community), but was released June 20 after three years and eight months in prison in the wake of a ruling by the Chief Prosecutor’s Office of the Supreme Court of Appeals. The decision came following a June 18 Constitutional Court ruling stating that Avcı’s rights had been violated.

Avcı told daily Hürriyet that he was not surprised by the Court of Appeals’ decision.

“They didn’t let me down. This decision is a not surprise to me,” Avcı told Hürriyet, claiming that “the verdict showed those who want justice for themselves do not want justice for others.”

He also said “it seems that he will go to prison for another four or five years.”

Despite being a former police chief who was famous for fighting leftists in his years as a senior official, a court said Avcı had been aiding and abetting the Revolutionary Headquarters, a leftist group which first came to public attention with Avcı’s initial arrest in 2010.