6.  The applicant was born in 1977.
7.  On 25 April 1999 the applicant was arrested and placed in police custody on suspicion of membership of an illegal organisation and the murder of thirteen persons. On the same day, she underwent a medical examination. The doctor who examined the applicant noted no sign of injury on her body.
8.  On 26 April 1999 police officers at the Istanbul Security Directorate took statements from the applicant in the absence of a lawyer. The applicant confessed that she was a member of the illegal organisation and admitted having planned an attack on a shopping centre and having acted as a lookout while other co-accused started a fire by throwing Molotov cocktails at the shopping centre, killing thirteen persons in March 1999.
9.  On 27 April 1999 the applicant was required to confront with two other co-accused before the police, in the absence of a lawyer. According to the record of the confrontation she admitted having carried out the attack on the shopping centre with those two and another co-accused.
10.  On the same day an identification parade took place at the Istanbul Security Directorate, in the absence of a lawyer, where one of the eyewitnesses of the incident identified the applicant in front of police officers and the public prosecutor at the State Security Court.
11.  On the same day the applicant was also required to participate in a reconstruction of the events (yer gösterme). According to the record drafted by police officers and signed by the applicant, the applicant described in detail what steps she had taken before the attack on the shopping centre and indicated how she had acted as a lookout while the other co-accused threw Molotov cocktails in the shopping centre.
12.  On 30 April 1999 the applicant was seen by a doctor at the Forensic Medicine Institution who noted in his report that the applicant bore no traces of ill-treatment.
13.  On the same day, the applicant was heard by the Istanbul Public Prosecutor and by the investigating judge, still in the absence of a lawyer. In her statements before both the public prosecutor and the investigating judge, the applicant denied the accusations and maintained that her statements to the police had been given under duress. Subsequently, the investigating judge ordered the applicant’s detention on remand.
14.  On 6 May 1999 the public prosecutor at the Istanbul State Security Court filed an indictment with that court, and charged the applicant with carrying out activities for the purpose of bringing about the secession of part of the national territory, pursuant to Article 125 of the former Criminal Code.
15.  The state security courts were later abolished by Law no. 5190 of 16 June 2004, and the case was transferred to the Istanbul Assize Court.
16.  On 7 May 2007 relying on, inter alia, the applicant’s statements to the police, the Istanbul Assize Court convicted the applicant as charged and sentenced her to life imprisonment for membership of an illegal organisation and the murder of thirteen people. In delivering its judgment, the Assize Court further took into consideration several items of evidence, such as the applicant’s statements to the police, public prosecutor and investigating judge, video recordings and written records of the crime scene visits, autopsy reports, eyewitness identifications, and the statements given by some of the accused persons.
17.  On 7 May 2009 the Court of Cassation upheld the judgment of the first instance court.