Events
It was decided by some non-governmental organisations to hold a rally on peace, labour and democracy in Ankara on Saturday 10/10/2015 between 12.00-16.00 hours after obtaining the necessary legal permissions. While the crowd gathered in front of Ankara Train Station on 10/10/2015 was preparing for the rally, two explosions occurred one after the other at 10.04 pm, killing many people and injuring many others.
The applicant claimed that the administration had a service defect for not taking sufficient measures on the day of the incident despite the intelligence information obtained before the bombing attack, and that his mental integrity was impaired due to his presence at the scene of the incident and the events he witnessed, and filed a full judgement lawsuit for non-pecuniary damages. The court dismissed the case and the applicant’s appeal was rejected by the regional administrative court.
Allegations
The applicant claimed that the principles of equality of arms and conflicting proceedings were violated due to the weakening of procedural facilities in the lawsuit he filed for compensation for non-pecuniary damages arising from the terrorist attack.
The Court’s Assessment
In the concrete case, the court made some inquiries as to whether the applicant was present at the scene of the incident and reached a conclusion based on the information sent by the administrative authorities. In addition, the court requested the administration to determine whether the applicant was at the scene of the incident by analysing data such as photographs, videos, minutes, hospital, police, prosecutor’s office records, MOBESE footage and HTS records, but the administration informed that there was no record of the applicant’s name and injury in the investigation initiated due to the incident. In this context, it was assessed that the public authorities did not conduct a sufficient investigation as to whether the applicant was at the scene of the incident.
In addition, it has been observed that no examination and evaluation was made regarding the photographs that the applicant claimed were taken at the scene of the incident, that his claim that his friend signed the autopsy report was not investigated, and all these issues were not discussed in the decision. In addition, the treatment documents related to the medical report submitted by the applicant were not subpoenaed and it was not investigated whether the medical diagnosis made in the report was medically determined to be related to the explosion incident. In this case, it is understood that the evidence, which would clearly have an impact on the merits, was not investigated by the court of first instance and was not taken into consideration in the evaluation of the result.
The applicant has raised allegations of service failure by emphasising that the respondent administration did not take the necessary precautions and that the interventions of the security forces after the explosions aggravated the consequences of the attack, but the judicial authorities did not conduct an investigation and evaluation in the context of these allegations of the applicant. In this case, the conclusion that there was no causal link between the explosion and the applicant’s psychological distress was not based on a research and examination appropriate to the concrete case.
Accordingly, when the judicial process is evaluated as a whole, it has been determined that the judicial authorities did not carry out sufficient examination and research on the allegations raised by the applicant in the compensation case he filed, and that the evidence affecting the merits was excluded from the evaluation. The fact that the court did not conduct any research and evaluation on the allegations put forward by the applicant, which could affect the outcome of the judgement, and that the judgement was made by giving precedence to the narrative of the administration regarding the way the incident occurred, resulted in the applicant being placed in a weak position compared to the defendant administration. This deficiency in the proceedings could not be compensated by the regional administrative court upon the applicant’s request for appeal. Therefore, this situation has damaged the fairness of the proceedings as a whole.
For the reasons explained above, the Constitutional Court held that the principles of equality of arms and conflicting judgements were violated.
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