Fashion designer Barbaros Şansal sentenced to prison for ‘degrading government’

* Photo: Barbaros Şansal Twitter account

Click to read the article in Turkish / Kurdish

Fashion designer Barbaros Şansal has been sentenced to 3 months, 22 days in prison as per the Article 301* of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK).

The İstanbul 52nd Penal Court of First Instance held the final hearing in the case filed upon the criminal complaint of President and ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the grounds that Barbaros Şansal allegedly "insulted, attacked and smeared his honor and dignity with the aim of attacking his personality rights."

His lawyer Efkan Bolaç demanded Şansal's acquittal on the grounds that the elements of the offense charged were not constituted.

However, the court has sentenced Şansal to prison. Neither has it deferred this prison sentence nor has it turned it into a judicial fine. Barbaros Şansal has the right to take the ruling to the appeals court.

Expert: Insulting and offending

The remarks of Şansal in the video were also sent by the court board to an expert. The expert was requested to determine whether the remarks were insulting or not. In the expert report signed by Assoc. Prof. İsmail Karaca from the Faculty of Letters of İstanbul University, it was concluded that remarks such as "pislik" (filth, mess, etc. in Turkish) and "dikmek" (which means "to sew" and "to erect" and also sounds similar to a word that means "to f*ck" in Turkish) were insulting and offending.

'We are winning by resisting'

The indictment filing charges against Şansal was issued over the following remarks of him in a video that he tweeted on December 1, 2017:

"And Semih is acquitted... And Nuriye is acquitted... And the filth of the government is before the eyes of the world. No matter how far away I am... I get happy with the good news coming from where my roots are.

"And I am telling you one thing: We are winning by resisting and resisting. We will send them away by sewing and sewing... We will stick up the secular, democratic, social state of law one more time. Now, please keep following me. Because life is good to me. Look, there is a full moon behind me... So, keep enjoying life and please love one another."

In his defense statement, Barbaros Şansal stated that "by sharing news about the developments in the trial of Semih Özakça and Nuriye Gülmen, who had been removed from public service by the Statutory Decrees of the State of Emergency, he wanted to emphasize social, secular, democratic state of law; by referring to the European Parliament, which is located in Brussels, he made such remarks to protest the fact that the aforementioned jailed people's application was rejected by the ECtHR; and his remarks were entirely meant to criticize the ECtHR in a critical tone for giving a ruling of rejection for Semih Özakça and Nuriye Gülmen."

However, prosecutor Celal Karadere came to the conclusion that these remarks "could be considered within the scope of the offense of publicly offending the government of the Republic of Turkey."

As the permission for investigation was given by the Justice Ministry's General Directorate of Penal Affairs, a court case was filed against Barbaros Şansal on charge of Article 301 of the TCK.

The court gave its ruling at the 7th hearing today.

Şansal penalized as per the same article before

On December 31, 2016, Barbaros Şansal posted a video on social media and criticized people for celebrating the new year in a period when several journalists were detained and there were widespread allegations of corruption and child abuse. "Drown in your shit, Turkey," he said.

Deported from Northern Cyprus on January 2, Şansal was sent to Turkey on January 2, 2017. When he arrived in İstanbul Atatürk Airport, he was attacked by a group while leaving the plane before he was taken into custody by the police. He had bruises and cuts in his body as a result.

Şansal was arrested on January 3 and released on March 2. Over his remarks in the video, he was sentenced to 6 months, 20 days in prison as per the Article 301 of the TCK. The sentence has been deferred.

* Article 301 of the TCK:

(1) A person who publicly degrades the Turkish Nation, State of the Turkish Republic, Turkish Grand National Assembly, the Government of the Republic of Turkey and the judicial bodies of the State shall be sentenced a penalty of imprisonment for a term of six months to two years.

(2) A person who publicly degrades the military or security organisations shall be sentenced according to the provision set out in paragraph one.

(3) The expression of an opinion for the purpose of criticism does not constitute an offence.

(4) The conduct of an investigation into such an offence shall be subject to the permission of the Minister of Justice.

(AS/SD)