Seeking Justice from Istanbul to Berlin

Türkçe aşağıda...

Greetings,

I'm Berke, you may know me from the Boğaziçi Car Case. Actually, I can say that the psychological, physical, financial, and moral torture I experienced increased significantly after this case.

(A photo after the police torture at the Boğaziçi University Pride March)

Since I was born in Adana, I have been discriminated against because of my lifestyle, ethnicity, sexuality, and religious identity. Not being Turkish and Sunni; and also being queer, neurodivergent, and vegan has always been a problem. But the culmination of all this started with the Boğaziçi University protests. During the 2 years of protests, I was just one of the students who was physically, verbally, and sexually tortured dozens of times by the police and university security. Lawsuits were unlawfully filed against me many times, and investigations were unlawfully conducted against me many times at the university. However, the breaking point for me was on October 5, 2021, when President Erdoğan directly targeted me on TV. Live on TV, he told the whole world that I was a terrorist because I was protesting his decision. An hour after Erdoğan's targeting, I was followed by plainclothes police and kidnapped under torture. Afterwards, I was unlawfully imprisoned. I spent 95 days in cell isolation. In prison, I was physically and psychologically tortured because of my political views, sexual identity, and religious beliefs. Although I am vegan, I was not given vegan food. I was deliberately starved. I was fed with a limited number of canned vegetables that I could buy. I was not given hot water to take a shower, and I was not given medicine when I was sick. After I was released from prison, I was unable to walk in Istanbul because I was targeted. All the police officers knew me and constantly harassed me. I heard the word "faggot terrorist" thousands of times and was subjected to physical and sexual violence dozens of times. During the Pride march at my university, the Istanbul police chief of the time came to the school and tried to prevent the march with torture. He succeeded in preventing it and detained people, saying that the Pride march was against the law. Then he came to me and said, "I know you. I'll beat you up in front of your partner," and ordered the police to torture me. They repeatedly hit my head against the police car and kicked me. The Istanbul police chief himself came and tortured me. He said I was a faggot terrorist and punched me in the face many times. Later, I was subjected to an LBTIQA+ phobic attack in Kadıköy, the most open-minded neighborhood of Istanbul. I was beaten in the square and threatened with death because I was queer. I was already used to death threats on social media, but this was one of the first direct and practical death threats.

On top of that, somehow, the Constitutional Court ruled that my unjust arrest in connection with the car case was justified:

So I decided to apply to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), but this is a very expensive (at least for me) process. So I thought of opening a GoFundMe for the costs of the ECHR process.

Now, however, I am facing a new challenge. The Tiergarten Court is demanding that I pay a fine of €4,000 for attempted "assault, claiming that I threw an empty pet/plastic bottle at the police during the International Queer Pride Parade in Berlin in 2024 and failed to hit the police". If I do not pay, the fine will be converted into a 100-day prison sentence. Therefore, I urgently need to hire a lawyer, and I need 500 euros upfront for the lawyer to take on the case. These amounts are too much for someone like me who earns 650 euros a month. That’s why I’ve decided to update and share my GoFundMe campaign again. I’m counting on your support. Solidarity...

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So why is this ECHR application important? Hundreds of students are being tried in courts like mine. Many of us have been subjected to serious violence from the school security guards to the police. We have been subjected to judicial harassment and given prison sentences. There are dozens of lawsuits filed against students. The Constitutional Court ruled that all this was legitimate. For this reason, the decision we will receive from the ECHR will set a precedent for other cases. In the case in which I was arrested, 13 other students were also sentenced to imprisonment and different penalties, and since it is currently in the court of appeal, if we can get a violation of rights decision from the ECHR, this will be a landmark decision for our case and other students' trials. We need this ruling to prevent other students from being unjustly and unlawfully arrested.

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As you can see, this whole process never ends. The costs keep increasing. I have a lot of debt due to Germany's bureaucratic difficulties. I have a lot of accumulated debt to lawyers (file costs, etc.) due to political lawsuits. Due to these cases, I cannot leave everything behind and return to Turkey. There are arrest warrants against me in three cases, and one of them involves a prison sentence. My fate is uncertain. In fact, I cannot even stay in Germany, as it is unclear how I can afford to live with such a large debt. That is why I have decided to launch a GoFundMe campaign for all of this.

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Merhabalar,

Ben Berke, beni boğaziçi araba davasından tanıyor olabilirsiniz. Aslında yaşadığım psikolojik, fiziksel, maddi ve manevi işkencelerin bu davadan sonra iyice yükseldiğini söyleyebilirim.

(boğaziçi üniversitesindeki Onur Yürüyüşü'nde maruz kaldığım polis işkencesinin sonrasında gözaltındayken çekilen fotoğrafım)

Bir de bunun üstüne nasıl olduysa Anayasa Mahkemesi, araba davasından dolayı haksızca tutuklanmamı haklı bulmuş:

Bu yüzden Avrupa İnsan Hakları Mahkemesi'ne(AİHM) başvurma kararı aldım ve süreçteki masraflar için GoFundMe kampanyası başlattım.

Şimdi ise karşıma yeni bir zorluk çıktı. Tiergarten Mahkemesi, 2024 yılında berlindeki Enternasyonel Onur Yürüyüşünde polise boş pet şu şişesi fırlattığımı ve kimseye isabet ettiremediğimi iddia ederek yaralamaya teşebbüsten 4000 euro para cezası ödememi istiyor. Ödemezsem 100 günlük hapis cezasına çevrileceği belirtiliyor. Bu yüzden acilen avukat tutmam gerekiyor ki avukatın dosyayı alması için başlangıçta 500 euroya ihtiyacım var. Bu sayılar benim gibi aylık 650 euro geliri olan birisi için çok fazla. Bu yüzden GoFundMe kampanyamı güncelleme ve tekrardan paylaşma kararı aldım. Desteklerinizi bekliyorum. Dayanışmayla...

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Peki bu AİHM başvurusu neden önemli derseniz, yüzlerce öğrenci benim gibi yargılanıyor. Bu süreçte birçoğumuz okulun güvenlik görevlilerinden polise ciddi şekilde şiddet gördük. Yargı tacizine maruz kaldık ve hapis cezaları verildi. Öğrenciler hakkında açılmış onlarca dava var. Anayasa mahkemesi ise bütün bu olanların meşru olduğuna karar verdi. Bu sebeple AİHM'den alacağımız karar diğer dava dosyaları için de emsal teşkil edecektir. Tutuklandığım davada diğer 13 öğrenciye de hapis kararı ve farklı cezalar çıktı ve şu an istinaf mahkemesinde olduğundan AİHM'den hak ihlali kararı alabilirsek bu dava dosyasına da sunabileceğiz. Başka öğrencilerin de haksız hukuksuz tutuklanmasının önüne geçebilmek için bu karara ihtiyacımız var.

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Fark edilebileceği üzere, bütün bu süreç asla bitmiyor. Masraflar arttıkça artıyor. Almanya'nın bürokratik zorlukları yüzünden çok fazla borcum var. Politik davalardan dolayı avukatlara olan(dosya masrafları vb.) birçok birikmiş borcum var. Yine bu davalar yüzünden her şeyi bırakıp Türkiye'ye de dönemiyorum. Hakkımda üç davada yakalama kararı, bir tanesinde de hapis cezası var. Sonumun ne olacağı belli değil. Aslında Almanya'da da değil, çünkü bu kadar borçla nasıl barınabileceğim bile meçhul. O yüzden bütün bunlar için gofundme açmaya karar verdim.