Developments unfold in case of high-profile femicide

MUĞLA

Surprising developments in the case of Pınar Gültekin, a university student who was strangled to death and later dumped in a forest after her body was burned in the Aegean province of Muğla last year, have unfolded.

The decision of non-prosecution of the Muğla Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office regarding the prime suspect Cemal Metin Avcı’s parents and his business partner for the crime of “destroying, concealing and changing criminal evidence” was overturned by the Chief Public Prosecutor of the Supreme Court.

A report prepared by the İzmir Forensic Medicine Directorate revealed that the cigarette butts seized from a barrel found at the crime scene matched with the DNA of Şükrü Gökhan O. and Ayten Avcı, the business partner and mother of the suspect.

“With this decision, an indictment will be prepared as soon as possible for the parents and business partner of the defendant who committed this brutal murder,” the lawyers of the Gültekin family said.

Meanwhile, at the fifth hearing of the case held on July 12, the Gültekin family’s request for a “rejection of the judge” was overruled by the court. Speaking at the hearing, the defendant Cemal Metin Avcı repeated that he committed the murder alone.

Gültekin had disappeared after leaving her home in Muğla on July 16, 2020. With mounting evidence against him, Cemal Metin Avcı confessed that he had strangled her to death before burning her body and dumping it in a forest.

Gültekin’s murder stirred public outrage in the country over the deaths of women at the hands of men, launching one of the biggest social media campaigns spearheaded by women calling for justice to be served and drawing attention to the issue of femicide in Turkey.