File 78 - Nuray Şen

16 items

Materials pertaining to the case filed by Nuray Şen on 25 April 1996 against the Republic of Turkey with the European Commission of Human Rights (application number 25354/94, referred to internally within the Kurdish Litigation Project as Case 110 and assigned to Tony Fisher as lead) regarding the 26 March 1994 kidnapping and subsequent killing of her husband, Mehmet Şen, a Democracy Party (DEP) candidate for Mayor of Ayran, Şanlıurfa Province in the 1994 elections.
Throughout his involvement with the DEP, Mehmet Şen was followed and threatened by plain-clothed police and this continued after the withdrawal of his candidacy. On 25 March 1994 Mehmet Şen informed the applicant that he was not being followed by the usual plain-clothed policemen but by other people whom he said might be hitmen. On 26 March 1994 at approximately 5 p.m., two plain-clothed policemen had a drink at the Çağdaş café in Birecik, which was owned by Mehmet Şen and Rasim Ağpak. At approximately 7 p.m., a car blocked the door of the café. Three plain-clothed persons entered, leaving the car engine running with a fourth person remaining in the vehicle. One of the three persons asked Rasim Ağpak whether he was Mehmet Şen. When he answered negatively, the person approached Mehmet Şen, who confirmed his identity and showed his identity card. Before the nine people in the café, the abductors stated that they were plain-clothed police who were there to take Mehmet Şen to the Security Directorate. Mehmet Şen was grabbed by the arms and taken away in the waiting car.
Upon hearing the news of the abduction, Nuray Şen contacted multiple authorities who denied holding Mehmet Şen or any knowledge of the abduction. On 28 March 1994 Nuray Şen applied to the Nizip Prosecutor by way of petition, reporting that Mehmet Şen had been abducted.
On 30 March 1994 an unknown person telephoned the Özgür Gündem newspaper and the Gaziantep Branch of the DEP, saying that Mehmet Şen’s body was at the Gaziantep State Hospital. Nuray Şen went to the hospital and, on examining the corpse, concluded that her husband had been killed under torture. She saw the body with the right eye gouged out, the right side of the head crushed to pieces, a broken right arm, broken fingers, marks of blows to the body, and a bullet wound to the head and one to the neck, with no traces of blood, implying that the shots had been fired after death. An autopsy report concluded that there was a bullet wound to the left side of the chest, a bullet wound above the right eyebrow, fired at almost point blank range, exiting the body from the back of the head, a bullet wound to the left cheek, fired at a distance of 95 cm, which had travelled through the body and lodged in the rib cage, that there were no other wounds, blows to the body or head, and that death had been caused by the bullet to the head.
Notably it transpired that the photographs provided by the Government during the case hearing, and in respect of which the witness noted several contradictions with the autopsy findings, were not of Mehmet Şen’s corpse. The European Court of Human Rights was persuaded, however, that Mehmet Şen was not tortured before being killed, and was unable to make a finding as to who might have been responsible for the death of Mehmet Şen. On 30 March 1994, the Court ruled unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights on account of the national authorities’ failure to carry out an adequate and effective investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death of the applicant’s husband, as well as a violation of Article 13, but that there were no violations of Article 3 or 14, nor a violation of Article 2 of the Convention as regards the applicant’s allegation that her husband was abducted and killed by State agents or persons acting on behalf of the State authorities. The Turkish Government was ordered to pay Nuray Şen €14,500 in non-pecuniary damages and €36,000 in legal costs and expenses (less €3,966 received in legal aid).The full judgment is available for viewing at https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-61681.
On 25 April 1996, Nuray Şen filed a second application (41478/98) regarding her complaint that she was detained for 11 days and was not brought before a judge within a reasonable time, invoking Article 5 § 3 of the Convention. She had been arrested on 10 November 1995 arrested on suspicion of PKK membership and brought to the Gendarme Intelligence and Anti-Terrorism Headquarters in Diyarbakır. On 21 November 1995, she was brought before the prosecutor at the Diyarbakır State Security Court who ordered her detention on remand. She was taken to Diyarbakır High Security Prison. She was released on bail at the first hearing before the Diyarbakır State Security Court on 15 February 1996. On 17 June 2003, the Court ruled unanimously in her favour. The Turkish Government was ordered to pay Nuray Şen €3,600 in non-pecuniary damages and €1,500 in legal costs and expenses. This judgment is available for viewing at https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-61139.
Materials available for access in the file include: the original application (25354/94) with appendices; statements of the applicant made to officials and to her legal representatives; correspondence between Tony Fisher, the Kurdish Human Rights Project, and the European Court of Human Rights pertaining to the second application (41478/98); and the applicant’s replies to the observations of the Government in both applications.

Correspondence from the European Commission of Human Rights and the Turkish Government pertaining to both applications, as well as all documents, observations, and appendices submitted to the Commission by the Government, are closed until 1 November 2073.

• Béarla

• Tuircis

• Fraincis