A forensic report that emerged six years after the death of Kurdish villager Servet Turgut has documented multiple injuries he suffered after being detained by Turkish gendarmes in southeastern Turkey in 2020, while the investigation into his death remains open.
The report from Turkey’s Council of Forensic Medicine (ATK), recently obtained by the Mezopotamya news agency, found that Turgut died from complications caused by severe blunt trauma, including injuries to his head, chest and internal organs. The agency did not specify when the report was prepared.
The report said Turgut suffered a brain hemorrhage and swelling, fractures to 11 ribs and his spine, damage to his lungs and injuries to his kidneys and adrenal glands. It listed multiple instances of organ failure resulting from the trauma among the causes of death.
Turgut and fellow villager Osman Şiban were detained by gendarmes on September 11, 2020, in the Çatak district of Van province following a military operation in the area. Witnesses said both men were in good health when they were taken away in a military helicopter.
Their families were unable to locate them for two days before learning that they had been hospitalized with serious injuries. Turgut was in intensive care and died on September 30, 2020, while Şiban survived with serious injuries and memory loss.
An investigation by investigative journalist and then-lawmaker Ahmet Şık later revealed that Turgut and Şiban were taken by helicopter to the Van provincial gendarmerie command and severely beaten after the aircraft landed.
Statements from 40 gendarmes who participated in the operation confirmed that Turgut and Şiban were uninjured when they were put aboard the helicopter and were later thrown into a large crowd and beaten.
The investigation into Turgut’s death and Şiban’s injuries remains open, but a confidentiality order on the case has not been lifted despite repeated requests by their lawyers. No one has been charged in connection with Turgut’s death.
Hamit Koçak, a lawyer representing Turgut and Şiban, said he did not believe an effective investigation had been conducted or that those responsible would be identified. He called on a recently established Justice Ministry unit tasked with investigating unsolved crimes to take up the case.
Şiban was sentenced in April 2023 to seven-and-a-half years in prison on charges of membership in a terrorist organization. The Adana Regional Court of Justice upheld the conviction in July 2025, after which his lawyers said they would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court of Appeals.
Five journalists who reported on the incident were also prosecuted on terrorism charges, four of whom were jailed pending trial in October 2020. All five were acquitted in January 2022.
