29 March 2017•Update: 29 March 2017
By Muhammed Enes Can & Murat Paksoy
ISTANBUL
Istanbul prosecutors Wednesday recommended life in jail for a suspect in the 1996 assassination of a Turkish tycoon, judicial sources said.
The Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office asked the court to sentence Ismail Akkol to an aggravated life sentence on charges of murdering Ozdemir Sabanci, a member of the board of the Sabanci Holding conglomerate, said the sources, who asked not to be named due to restrictions on speaking to the media.
Akkol, an alleged member of the terrorist Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), is also accused of trying to subvert the Turkish constitution and blocking the work of parliament, the sources added.
In 1996 Sabanci was shot dead on the 25th floor of the Sabanci Holding building in Istanbul along with his secretary and another executive. New information provided by one of the alleged killers reawakened the investigation in 2010.
Police identified the culprits in the murder as Akkol, Fehriye Erdal, and Mustafa Duyar. Duyar was jailed and later killed in a prison riot in 1999. Erdal and Akkol became fugitives.
However, the 45-year-old Akkol was recaptured in February 2016 -- 20 years after the murder -- and charged with plotting a terrorist attack.
Erdal was detained for having a fake passport in a 1999 fire in Knokke, Belgium, where she was staying. After serving a year in prison, she was put under house arrest but fled in March 2006.
Last month the Bruges High Criminal Court sentenced Erdal in absentia to 15 years in prison for her crimes committed in Turkey.
The same court in May 2016 said Erdal should be tried in Belgium. Erdal’s extradition from Belgium has long been sought by Ankara.
Last year DHKP-C member Akkol reportedly entered Turkey on false passports from a nearby Greek island and had been planning to assassinate a leading figure from industry or politics.
