5 Police Officers Arrested In Mersin Operation Released Pending Trial

All five police officers who were arrested in a Mersin-based operation as part of a wave of investigations into police officers on charges of illegal wiretapping have been released pending trial.

A total of 66 people were detained on June 1 in nine provinces around the country in an operation that was based in the southern province of Mersin. The detention orders were issued on charges of illegal wiretapping.

While five of the suspects were arrested, the rest were released by the court. The first hearing in the case was held at the Mersin 2nd High Criminal Court on Thursday. Police officers Hüseyin Avcı, Ahmet Şanverdi and Bekir Kaymakçı as well as police chiefs Erdem Kanmaz and Suat Dağlı, who have all been under arrest, presented their defense statements during the hearing. The court ruled to release all five pending trial.

The operations against the police, which prosecutors say were launched after allegations of spying and illegal wiretapping, are widely believed to be an act of government retaliation for the corruption investigation that went public on Dec. 17, 2013. The corruption investigation resulted in the detentions of dozens of people, including businessmen close to the government, senior bureaucrats and the sons of three former ministers.

Thousands of police officials and officers, as well as judges and prosecutors, were reassigned or removed in the aftermath of the Dec. 17, 2013 corruption and bribery scandal. Many among them were later prosecuted and imprisoned pending trial on the charge of membership in the "parallel structure."

(Cihan/Today's Zaman)