Turkish court rejects Dink family lawyer request to summon hitman’s father

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Istanbul 14th High Criminal Court, which is hearing the trial of the suspects accused of killing Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, has turned down a request from Dink family lawyers to hear the testimony of the hitman’s father in court.

Ogün Samast’s father, Ahmet Samast, during his interrogation by police shortly after the murder and before Samast was captured, stated that “his commander would know best where Ogün might be hiding.”

Lawyers for the Dink family have requested to hear Ahmet Samast’s testimony in court to learn more information about this mysterious commander who apparently had ties with Samast. However, the court turned down the request on the grounds that Ahmet Samast’s testimony “would not contribute to the investigation.”

Lawyer Fethiye Çetin had brought up Ahmet Samast’s testimony, based on the testimony of former Trabzon Deputy Chief of Police Necati Ekinci, submitted to the court on March 24, 2010. Ekinci said Ahmet Samast had shown up at the police station on the day of the murder, saying he had identified the suspected shooter as his son.

Ekinci said: “When we asked his [Ogün’s] father where we could find him, he told me, ‘We can find him at Internet cafes.’ He showed me an Internet café that Samast frequented, but we couldn’t find him there. When we asked him if there was any other place we could look, he said, ‘The gendarmerie commander might find Ogün.’ When we asked what kind of relationship he might have to the gendarmerie commander, he told us that Ogün frequently met up with the gendarmerie commander.”

This testimony strengthens the lawyers’ long-standing assertion that the Dink murder was perpetrated by a complex network of individuals connected with the military and perhaps other state agencies. A number of gendarmerie officers have been tried for Dink’s murder, mostly on charges of negligence or ignoring intelligence that might have been used to prevent the shooting. The court said finding out more about the gendarmerie commander mentioned in Ekinci’s testimony would not “contribute to the trial at this stage.”

Meanwhile, the last scheduled hearing in a separate case where eight suspects - including Trabzon Gendarmerie Commander Col. Ali Öz, Gendarmerie Intelligence Unit Director Capt. Metin Yıldız and gendarmerie NCOs Okan Şimşek and Veysel Şahin, who stand accused of neglect of duty, was heard on Tuesday, March 29. Dink family lawyers accuse the suspects of assisting the murderers at the time the plan to assassinate Dink was being hatched. The suspects face up to two years in prison if convicted. The trial has been adjourned indefinitely for the court panel to discuss whether the case of the gendarmerie officers should be merged with the main murder trial in Istanbul.

In a related development, statements taken from former Deputy Police Chief Emin Arslan and Chief Inspector of Police Levent Yarımel concerning the Dink murder were submitted to the Trabzon Prosecutor’s Office, Today’s Zaman reported.