Ergenekon lawyer sues gendarmerie

ISTANBUL - Doğan News Agency

Tuncay Özkan’s lawyer, Hüseyin Ersöz, filed a criminal complaint against gendarmerie officers for committing acts of violence against him and two other lawyers in disproportionate levels during events on March 11 at the Istanbul 13th High Criminal Court in relation to a hearing of the Ergenekon trial.

Ersöz said the officers showed a disproportionate use of force against the lawyers when the two came to blows on March 11 after a judge ordered a lawyer to leave the courtroom, claiming the lawyers were victims of physical violence. The gendarmerie forces, however, said they were not the only ones responsible for the treatment of lawyers, Ersöz added.

“For the first time in the Ergenekon case we saw that judges directed gendarmerie personnel to intervene against the lawyers. You allowed our friends to be thrown out of the courthouse,” Ersöz said. Ersöz, with fellow lawyer Zeynep Küçük, also requested the recusation of the judges, but was subsequently refused by the court delegation.