‘Officers will be punished for beating’

AFYONKARAHİSAR - Hürriyet Daily News

Video recording of the two police beating a woman was released last week.

Family and Social Policies Minister Fatma Şahin has said the police officers who beat up a woman at a police station in İzmir should be punished.

The minister said violence at police stations, especially against a woman, is unacceptable. 
“One of our biggest problems back in the 1990s was violence at police stations,” Şahin was quoted by the Anatolia news agency as saying Dec. 10 during a visit to the governor in the western province of Afyonkarahisar. “With the implementation of ‘zero tolerance for violence’ as a state policy in the 2000s, the government has been doing its best to solve the problem.”

Şahin’s remarks came one day after a Turkish daily released footage showing three police officers beating a detained woman in the Aegean province of İzmir.

The footage was obtained from a police station in İzmir and was recorded in July, according to the report by Kemal Göktaş of daily Vatan. 

The three police officers were temporarily relieved of their duties, İzmir police said in a written statement Dec. 10. The statement claimed that Fevziye Cengiz, the victim of the beating, resisted police officers and police officers Tekin Doğan, Beyit Sezgen and Hakan Yörük filed a complaint against her.

Cengiz was at a music hall with her husband and other family members in July when police raided the location to conduct an identification check. Cengiz’s husband reportedly went to their car parked nearby to fetch her ID card. 

Cengiz said she was trying to explain to the officers that her husband was bringing her ID from the car, when one of the officers allegedly hit her from behind and said, “Don’t you want to come [expletive],” and forcefully detained her. 

Police officers allegedly continued the beating all the way to the police station, Cengiz said.