Lawyer Gülen On Trial For Threatening Columnist Ahmet Hakan.

The trial of  Kemalettin Gülen, who is accused of threatening Ahmet Hakan Coşkun, a columnist for daily Hürriyet, has begun at Istanbul’s 1st Criminal Court of Peace.

Coskun claims that Gülen threatened him after his March 31 column in which he criticized Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and wrote not even a toy gun was fired when Adnan Menderes, prime minister pf the period, was hung.

Prosecutor is asking for two year prison sentence for Gülen

Gülen is alleged to have threatened Coskun by saying “if the party is closed you will see whether a toy gun or something else will be fired” according to the indictment of the case.

Gülen, who is assumed to be Fethullah Gülen’s relative, is on trial under article 106 of the Turkish Penal Code about the crime of threatening someone. Fethullah Gülen is the leader of a big Islamic group in Turkey.

Only accused Gülen showed up in yesterday’s hearing, the complainant and his lawyer did not come.

The accused denies the allegation that he threatened the columnist. The court decided to bring the columnist to the court by force since he was already asked to appear. The case was postponed to another day. 

Türker Alkan receives death threat from a “Police” reader

In September 2007, another columnist, Türker Alkan of daily Radikal, had written that the death threats he had used to receive before the February 22 period had begun again after the July 22 elections.

“After July 22, angry and threatening letters started coming again. In a e-mail I received recently, a person who claimed to be a police officer told me in his mail that I was a traitor and he was going to put two bullets in my head. Who knows if he was a police officer, but even if he was not one, one wonders how it should be interpreted that he has chosen this role.