A Turkish journalist was jailed Saturday after reporting allegations that the son of a ruling party lawmaker brought a weapon to a school in western Turkey, the T24 news website reported.
Journalist Yelis Ayaz was arrested by a court in Aydın under Turkey’s law against publicly spreading false or misleading information. Another journalist detained in the same investigation for his reporting, identified as Emin A., was released pending trial under judicial supervision.
The Aydın Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said the investigation was opened amid heightened public concern after two recent school shootings in southern Turkey. In one incident in Şanlıurfa province last month, a former student wounded 16 people at a vocational school before killing himself. A day later, a 14-year-old student killed eight fellow students and one teacher at their school in neighboring Kahramanmaraş province, with one student injured in the attack dying in the hospital two weeks later.
The reports by journalists cited complaints submitted to CİMER, a government-run public complaint portal, by four students who claimed the son of Seda Sarıbaş, a lawmaker from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), brought a gun to school and that administrators covered up the incident.
Prosecutors said the allegations reported by the journalists were a misrepresentation of a separate 2024 disciplinary case involving students photographed with a toy pellet gun. Prosecutors said one student received a five-day suspension over the incident and that the student involved was not related to a public official or member of parliament.
Prosecutors also said the reports were false and risked causing public fear and panic.
The prosecutor’s office said some of the CİMER complaints appeared to have been filed after the investigation began and intended to create the impression that the allegations had previously been reported to authorities.
Article 217/A of the Turkish Penal Code, enacted as part of a 2022 “disinformation” law, dictates prison sentences for people convicted of publicly spreading false information in a way deemed likely to disturb public order. Press freedom groups and opposition politicians have criticized the law, saying it gives authorities broad power to prosecute journalists and social media users over disputed information.
More than 300 journalists faced prosecution over the past year.
According to Expression Interrupted, a press freedom monitoring group, 27 journalists are currently behind bars in Turkey. The country’s deteriorating media landscape was further pointed out in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders (RSF), where it was ranked 163rd out of 180 nations.
