Court of Cassation drops Dargeçit JİTEM case due to statute of limitations

The Court of Cassation has dropped a high-profile case involving the disappearance of nine people in the Dargeçit district of Mardin between 1995-96.

The 1st Penal Chamber of the top appeals court ruled that the 30-year statute of limitations has expired for the trial, which involved both civilians and a military officer as part of a series of legal proceedings concerning state-linked violence from that era known as Gendarmerie Intelligence Counterterrorism (JİTEM) cases.

JİTEM, whose existence has never been officially confirmed, is accused of perpetrating thousands of extrajudicial killings in the country’s mostly Kurdish-populated regions during the conflict in the 1990s. While several cases were opened in the early 2010s against former gendarmerie and security officials, most have concluded with courts finding no such organization exists. The Dargeçit JİTEM case is the latest to end without convictions.

Killings and acquittals

In 2022, the Adıyaman 1st Heavy Penal Court acquitted 18 defendants, including former Mardin Gendarmerie Commando Battalion Commander Hurşit İmren, Dargeçit District Gendarmerie Commander Mehmet Tire, and Dargeçit Central Gendarmerie Station Commander Mahmut Yılmaz. The Gaziantep Regional Administrative Court later upheld the acquittals.

Lawyer Erdal Kuzu, representing the Human Rights Association (İHD), appealed the ruling to the Court of Cassation. The top court overturned the acquittal but simultaneously ruled unanimously to drop the case because of the statute of limitations.

Between Oct 29, 1995, and Mar 8, 1996, Davut Altınkaynak (12), Seyhan Doğan (14), Nedim Akyön (16), Mehmet Emin Aslan, Abdurrahman Olcay, Abdurrahman Coşkun, Hikmet Kaya, Süleyman Seyhan, and sergeant Bilal Batırır disappeared in Dargeçit. The remains of some victims were discovered years later. Soldiers, village guards, and sergeants were subsequently charged with premeditated murder.

Confession that led to the opening of the case

A notable development in the trial was the 2013 testimony of Muhammet Demirel, the former Mardin Gendarmerie Intelligence Branch Manager. Demirel stated that a gendarmerie intelligence team known as JİT operated in Mardin and was affiliated with the Diyarbakır Gendarmerie Intelligence Group Command.

Official documents also revealed that the coordinates of caves where the bones of Nedim Akyön and Davut Altınkaynak were found matched coordinates in 1995 military reports. However, the trial court dismissed witness testimonies as hearsay and acquitted the defendants, citing a lack of “concrete and conclusive evidence beyond all doubt.”

The trial, which began in Midyat in 2014, was moved to Adıyaman for security reasons and briefly transferred to the Ankara 5th Heavy Penal Court before returning to Adıyaman. During the proceedings, the court was unable to reach former prosecutor Adem Kul for testimony for a long period, only to later discover he was incarcerated as part of another investigation.

(NÖ/VK)