PROCEDURE

The case originated in an application (no. 19180/03) against the Republic of Turkey lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by six Turkish nationals, Mrs Nafiye Çetin, Mr Necat Çetin, Mr Nezir Çetin, Mr Adnan Çetin, Mrs Nuriye Kaymış and Leman Ekingen (“the applicants”), on 30 April 2003.

The applicants were represented by Mr S. Korkmaz, Mr A. Süer and Ms I. Midyat, lawyers practising in Diyarbakır. The Turkish Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent.

On 5 November 2007 the President of the Second Section decided to give notice of the application. It was also decided to examine the merits of the application at the same time as its admissibility (Article 29 § 3).

THE FACTS

I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE CASE

The applicants were born in 1929, 1972, 1956, 1966, 1963 and 1953 respectively, and live in Mersin except for the third and the fourth applicants who reside in Diyarbakır and Şanlıurfa respectively.

The first applicant’s son and the other applicants’ brother, Harun Çetin, was a student at the Istanbul University at the time of the events.

On 15 March 1993 Harun Çetin was arrested and taken into police custody, together with his friend Mr Ö.Yüce, at the Avcılar Campus of Istanbul University. They had Molotov cocktails in their possession.

On 16 March 1993, while in detention, Harun Çetin’s health deteriorated and he was admitted to Şişli Etfal Hospital. On the same day, he was transferred to Cerrahpaşa hospital. On his arrival, Harun Çetin was unconscious and had slight bruises and abrasions on various parts of his body. A brain scan revealed a subdural haematoma in the right fronto-temporo‑parietal region. He was immediately operated on and remained in the hospital’s intensive care unit until 9 June 1993, without, it appears, regaining consciousness. Harun Çetin was later transferred, first to Bakırköy Reanimation Center and later to Taksim Hospital where he died on 5 September 1993. He was twenty years old.

On 8 September 1993, upon the request of the Beyoğlu public prosecutor, an autopsy was carried out on Harun Çetin at the Cerrahpaşa Medical Faculty. According to the autopsy report, drawn up on 22 December 1993, the cause of death was attributed to pneumonia related respiratory insufficiency which had developed as a result of his transition from active to passive, following the subdural brain haemorrhage suffered from a head trauma.

In the meantime, on 16 March 1993 Mr Yüce gave a statement to the police in which he claimed, inter alia, that he and Harun Çetin had been beaten both by the police officers who had arrested them and by the police officers at the Avcılar police station where they were interrogated, and that Harun Çetin’s poor health might have resulted from these beatings.

Between 3 September 1993 and 4 October 1993, a prosecutor took the statements of eleven police officers who were working either at the Avcılar police station or the anti-terror branch of the Security Directorate.

In an indictment dated 31 December 1993, the public prosecutor at the Bakırköy Assize Court accused Mr U.A., the police chief at the anti-terror branch of the Avcılar Security Directorate and Mr I.H., a police officer in the same department, of causing Harun Çetin’s death, unintentionally, as a result of ill‑treatment. They were also accused of ill-treating Mr Yüce. The charges were brought under Articles 452 § 1, 243 §§ 1 and 2 of the Criminal Code.

On 5 January 1994 the criminal proceedings against the accused police officers began before the Bakırköy Assize Court. The first hearing was fixed for 8 April 1994.

Between 8 April 1994 and 24 February 2006 the court held thirty‑three hearings, during which it mainly took numerous procedural decisions in order to establish the whereabouts of Mr Yüce, without success.

In the hearing held on 8 April 1994 the applicants, except for Mrs Nuriye Kaymış, joined the proceedings as civil parties (müdahil).

The court heard the police officers, who denied the accusations against them at the hearing held on 1 July 1994.

In a petition dated 28 October 1994, the civil parties requested the court to conduct an additional investigation. In this connection, they asked the court to request the medical records of the deceased and to hear a number of witnesses, including the doctors who had treated Harun Çetin and the police officers whose names featured in the official documents in respect of Harun Çetin’s arrest and detention.

In the hearing held on 16 May 1995, the court dismissed these requests as being irrelevant to the outcome of the case.

On 26 October 2001 the court decided not to hear Mr Yüce since he could not be found. However, at the next hearing on 31 May 2002, the prosecutor argued that, since no detailed statement had been obtained from Mr Yüce at the investigative stage, it was important for the court to hear him. In this connection, the prosecutor noted that Mr Yüce had claimed to have been beaten on arrest and at the police station, and that the Avcılar central police station and the anti-terror branch were in the same building. The court agreed.

On 12 October 2005 the court, once again, decided not to hear Mr Yüce since he could not be found. On that date, the prosecutor submitted his observations on the merits.

On 24 February 2006 the Bakırköy Assize Court held that the accused had ill-treated Harun Çetin with a view to extracting a confession of guilt and had caused his death. The police officers were sentenced to six years and six months’ imprisonment pursuant to Articles 452 § 1 and 59 § 2 of the Criminal Code. The court decided to discontinue the proceedings regarding the ill-treatment of Mr Yüce as that prosecution had become time-barred (zamanaşımı).

The police officers appealed.

The applicants submitted that, since they feared that a further prolongation in the case would result in its dismissal for being time-barred, they did not appeal against this decision.

On 26 February 2007 the principal public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation submitted his written opinion, mentioning the approaching time-bar.

On 9 May 2007 the Court of Cassation quashed the judgment of the first-instance court on account of an insufficient investigation into the events in question. In this connection, it considered that the first-instance court should have heard Mr Yüce and the witnesses mentioned in the applicants’ petition of 28 October 1994.

The case was remitted to the Bakırköy Assize Court on 20 June 2007. In the hearing held on 21 November 2007, the court decided to obtain the medical records of the deceased and to hear two persons cited by the applicants in their petition of 28 October 1994.

The proceedings are still pending.