ANKARA
An Istanbul court ordered Monday the arrest of a Turkish police chief, who was suspected of negligence in the murder case of a Turkish-Armenian journalist in 2007, hours after he surrendered to Ankara police department.
Ercan Demir was brought to Istanbul’s fifth penal court, where he was charged with causing the death of Hrant Dink by “deliberate negligence."
Demir was police chief in Turkey’s Trabzon province when Dink was murdered in Istanbul. The murderer, Ogun Samast, reportedly came from Trabzon.
The surrender came three days after an Istanbul court, on the appeal of the prosecutor, decided Friday to issue an arrest warrant for Demir, who was removed from his post as police chief in Cizre town in Turkey’s southeastern province of Sirnak. He was said to be due to get appointed at Ankara police department’s Information Technologies unit.
High-profile figures who were questioned about the case last month included former Istanbul Vice Governor Ergun Gungor, former Istanbul police chief Celalettin Cerrah and former Istanbul police intelligence unit chief Ahmet Ilhan Guler.
Demir was previously questioned by an Istanbul prosecutor last Monday and detained for two days. He was released on conditional probation by an Istanbul court Wednesday.
Dink's murderer, Samast, who was 17-years-old at the time, was tried and convicted in 2011.
Dink was the editor-in-chief of the weekly newspaper Agos and was considered to be one of the most prominent Armenian voices in Turkey.
Samast, who is serving a 23-year sentence in prison, said he killed Dink for insulting “Turkishness.”
