Alıntı: Yazan Konuk What should I do when a Turkish police officer insults me and violates my privacy rights? I have a dual citizenship, Turkish and Norwegian, and each time I enter and exit turkey there is a problem at the passport control. Because of a name similarity, I normally wait 10 minutes for the officer to make a call to the headcounters and clear up the situation. This has happened 5 times until now, and every officer I have meet has been very friendly and apologized for the inconvenience. Yesterday, I took the ferry from Samos (Greece) to Kusadasi. At the passport control witch was a bit busy, the officer made a call from her own mobile phone while controlling other people’s passports, and gave out my personal information such as pasportnumber, birthplace, name, TC-kimlik number (Turkish social security number), parents name etc. This bothered me a lot, it was highly sensitive information given out publicly, and people around me could hear it. I tried tell her that what see did is wrong and expected her to apologize, but instead se insulted me by shouting names at me. In a situation like this, what should my reaction be? I honestly didn’t know what to do when she shouted. Can I take legal action?

Dear Konuk (Guest),

Insulting is a crime which has been regulated in 125 th article (*) of the Turkish Penal Code. You can submit complaint petition both to the Public Prosecutor and to the manager of the officer concerning her act. Public Prosecutor may open a case if he/she has been convicted that collected evidences constitute sufficient suspicion that a crime has been committed. In this case it is the criminal court of peace that will decide whether the act committed has been constituted a crime or not. Besides the manager of the officer may impose an administrative measure on her upon your complaint. You can also may file an action for spiritual damages at the civil court. But all depends that whether the officer is really guilty and faulty before law and regulations in the light of evidences. Her act may be evaluated within legal limits or may be regarded that the officer had no intent of committing a crime.

Best regards.

Offenses Against Honor
Defamation
(*) ARTICLE 125- (1) Any person who acts with the intention to harm the honor, reputation or dignity of another person through concrete performance or giving impression of intent, is sentenced to imprisonment from three months to two years or imposed punitive fine.
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(4) The punishment is increased by one sixth in case of performance of defamation act openly; if the offense is committed through press and use of any one of publication organs, then the punishment is increased up to one third.