Turkish pop star vanishes after conviction

ISTANBUL

Police raided four addresses to arrest Deniz Seki, including her residence in Istanbul’s neighborhood of Tarabya, but failed to find the singer.

Turkish pop star Deniz Seki has vanished without a trace days after her drug conviction was approved by a high court.

Turkey’s Court of Appeals had approved Seki’s conviction for drug trafficking last week and sent the file to the prosecution for the execution of the 75-month prison sentence, which was meted out earlier by the Istanbul 13th Court of Serious Crimes. Seki is required to serve at least two and a half years in prison.

Police raided four addresses to arrest the pop star, including her residence in Istanbul’s affluent neighborhood of Tarabya, on June 1, but failed to find the singer.

“We want justice,” Seki had said in a message on Twitter the previous day, while adding: “No hopes, but prayers.”

Bülent Seyhan, the producer of Seki’s albums, said on June 3 that they had recently completed a new album. “Her phone is off. If she says that she’ll be in prison and doesn’t want to release an album now, I won’t release it,” Seyhan said.

Hürriyet columnist Ayşe Arman, on the other hand, wrote that she spoke to Seki’s mother. “According to what she told me, Deniz [Seki] hasn’t run away. Her brother-in-law has died. She’s mourning for him, who had done a lot for her,” Arman wrote.