Two Istanbul women killed despite dozens of complaints over death threats

Aziz Özen – ISTANBUL

DHA photo

Two women in Istanbul’s Çekmeköy district have been killed by the former husband of one of them, despite filing dozens of complaints with state institutions.

Ayşe Yazıcı, 38, and her friend Leyla Ad, 40, were killed after Yazıcı’s former husband Behçet Yıldız, 44, shot Yazıcı in the chest and Ad in the head at around 3:30 p.m. on Sept. 14.

Yıldız reportedly sped away after hijacking a car and is reported to still be at large. 

The bodies of the killed women have been taken to the Istanbul Forensic Institute for medical examination.

Yazıcı’s father said his daughter was threatened and subjected to violence for years after she divorced from Yıldız. 

“[The perpetrator] brandished a weapon at her once so we filed a lawsuit. But nobody cared about the case. My daughter filed 50 complaints with the police after the two were officially divorced,” he said. 

“[After nothing was done] she also filed an online complaint with the presidency. Police officers were dispatched but they told my daughter ‘Are we not able to protect you? Why do you file complaints [with the presidency]?’ every time they came,” added the father of Yazıcı, who had a 14-year-old daughter. 

“But in the end they could not protect my daughter,” he said.

Meanwhile, a police officer identified as Erdoğan K. was detained on Sept. 15 in the Black Sea province of Samsun after he shot Hatice Şahin, the sister of his estranged wife, dead in Samsun’s Canik district on the night of Sept. 14.

The officer, working in the northwestern province of Kocaeli, reportedly started a dispute with Şahin for familial reasons.