Purge victim dies of heart attack in Turkish prison

Muzaffer Özcengiz, a dismissed teacher, who was jailed after a controversial coup attempt in Turkey on July 15, 2016 died on Sunday at a prison in the Çorum province. Özcengiz reportedly was in a solitary confinement for the last 14 months.

Özcengiz’s relatives told he suffered hypertension and diabetics. Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu, a human rights activist and deputy of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) wrote on his twitter account that Özcengiz’s medical analysis dated April 10 was so alarming that he should have been stayed in hospital, instead he returned to solitary confinement in prison.

Özcengiz was sentenced to 12 years and 6 months in prison due to alleged links to the civic faith-based Gülen movement. Following a coup attempt in 2016, the Turkish government launched a massive crackdown on followers of the movement under the pretext of an anti-coup fight as a result of which more than 150,000 people were removed from state jobs while in excess of 50,000 others were jailed and some 600,000 people have been investigated on allegations of terrorism.

There have been many cases of people who died in jail since 2016, some suspiciously, because they were denied crucial treatment or subjected to maltreatment or acts of torture.

The Stockholm Center for Freedom (SCF) reported in one of its studies titled “Suspicious Deaths and Suicides In Turkey” that there has been an increase in the number of suspicious deaths in Turkey, most in jails and detention centers where torture and ill treatment are practiced. In a majority of cases authorities ruled them as suicides without any effective, independent investigation.

Suspicious deaths have also taken place beyond prison walls amid psychological pressure and threats of imminent imprisonment and torture, sometimes following the release of suspects or just before their detention.

SCF compiled 126 cases of suspicious death and suicides in Turkey in a searchable database format.

The post Purge victim dies of heart attack in Turkish prison appeared first on Stockholm Center for Freedom.

from SCF