Families Offered Money To Withdraw Complaints Over Elevator Accident

The father of one of 10 workers killed in an elevator accident last month at the construction site of a high-rise residential building in İstanbul has said the construction company offered to give TL 700,000 to the families of the victims if they withdrew the complaints they had filed.

Selim Tatoğlu, father of Cengiz Tatoğlu, who was killed in the accident, said the lawyer representing Torunlar GYO, the owner of the construction project, recently called him and said: “Let's make a deal. Other families have agreed on TL 700,000.”

“I said they [other families] may be in need of money and turned down the offer. I asked what they [the lawyers] would do if it was their son who had died. They still called me to have a meeting on Oct. 25. I said OK. But I do not think I will be able to go. I have other things to do,” he said.

Turkey was shaken on Sept. 6 when the accident occurred at the construction site of the Torun Center residence project in the central İstanbul neighborhood of Mecidiyeköy. An elevator fell 32 floors in the building being worked on with 10 workers inside.

Shortly after the accident, inspectors from the Labor and Social Security Ministry found at least three incidences of negligence that were probable contributing factors to the elevator accident.

Torunlar GYO was accused of ignoring its responsibility to perform periodical maintenance checks and repairs on the elevator.

An İstanbul court last week dropped charges against Torunlar GYO CEO Aziz Torun; the firm's deputy general manager, Yunus Emre Torun; Deputy CEO Mehmet Torun; accounting manager Müdürü Lütfü Vardı; purchasing manager Abdülvahit Kaplan; the Torun Center project coordinator, Tuncer Akarçay; and job safety experts Haluk Okur, Bektaş Ateş and Özmen Özmenoğlu.

The Torunlar Group was founded in 1977 and was a medium-sized business until 1996, when it founded its subsidiary Toray Construction, which constructed the company's first shopping mall project in 1997. Since then the company has continued to grow.

(Cihan/Today's Zaman)