Importation of Narcotic Drugs (TCK Articles 188/1 and 188/4-a) – Reversal Decision

The court decisions published in this section were obtained in cases in which Attorney Mert Sönmez personally acted as counsel and defense counsel.

REPUBLIC OF TÜRKİYE

*** COURT

CASE NO: ***

DECISION NO: ***

REASONING

The defendants denied the charge at every stage; the suitcase in which narcotic substances were found was never collected by the defendants; the defendants were not on the aircraft in which the narcotics were found and were later apprehended while leaving their hotel; and the examinations of their mobile phones produced no finding linking them to the seized narcotics. Although the luggage tag on the suitcase was registered in the name of ***, no investigation was conducted against *** as a suspect. After making a detailed report, the informant later testified in court, as confidential witness ***, that the information had been given to that witness by another person. In these circumstances, the defendants’ legal status should have been determined only after investigating whether the two prints recovered from the narcotics packaging belonged to confidential witness ***, filing a criminal complaint for an investigation comparing the print found on the packaging with the fingerprints and palm prints of *** and the employees whom *** stated had traveled together on the same aircraft, and awaiting the outcome. Rendering judgment on an incomplete investigation was contrary to law.

Furthermore, a sufficient number of the law-enforcement officers who signed the initial incident report should have been heard and questioned about their record stating that no one came to collect the suitcase containing the narcotics even though it could have been collected by persons traveling on the aircraft; whether they waited until the final opportunity; and whether the airport security-camera recordings were examined. Rendering judgment without those inquiries likewise rested on incomplete examination and investigation and was contrary to law.

Even assuming otherwise:

At the fifth hearing on 15/05/2025, the defenses were recorded through SEGBİS, but neither the transcript nor the CD recording was converted into a hearing record and physically placed in the file. In view of CMK Article 219/1 et seq. and Article 222, the course of the hearing must be recorded in hearing minutes. Failure to convert the SEGBİS recordings into a written record, sign it through the presiding judge and the relevant clerk, and place it in the file was contrary to law.

JUDGMENT

The appellate applications are accepted and the judgment rendered against the defendants is REVERSED pursuant to CMK Article 280/1-e of Law no. 5271.

Considering the periods already spent in detention, the state of the evidence concerning the charged offense, that the offense is among those listed in CMK Article 100/3, and the resulting risk of flight, THE CONTINUED DETENTION OF EACH DEFENDANT is ordered.

As no appeal was filed to their detriment, the defendants’ ACQUIRED RIGHTS as to the amount of punishment shall be preserved when a new judgment is rendered, pursuant to CMK Article 283/1.

The file shall be SENT to the first-instance court whose judgment has been reversed for re-examination and judgment in accordance with the reversal decision.

Pursuant to CMK Article 284/1 of Law no. 5271