Imamoglu enters torture allegations into Silivri court record at hearing of CHP presidential bid case

At the April 28 hearing of the "Ekrem Imamoglu Criminal Organization" case at the Silivri prison court, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu -- the CHP's presidential candidate and the elected mayor of a city he described to the bench as having 15.5 million voters -- used his time questioning a cooperating witness to enter into the court record an account of torture and ill-treatment after his detention. Speaking to the prosecution, he described "a very difficult five days" between March 19 and March 23, 2025, saying he and his co-defendants were held without food and water; the first day fell during Ramadan, when he was already fasting, but the deprivation became palpable afterwards. He said the treatment had been turned into "a routine" and was "still being carried out".

Imamoglu also recounted being brought up from the basement of Caglayan Courthouse to a hearing where a prosecutor -- whose name he learned only later as Cahit Cihat Sari, since appointed by Justice Minister Akin Gurlek to head the ministry's Personnel Department -- opened immediately with a tirade about an audio recording, using profane and insulting language. Two of Imamoglu's lawyers, including Mehmet Pehlivan, were present alongside a third; Imamoglu turned and asked to whom the prosecutor was speaking, and was told the target was Adem Soytekin, who had testified before them.

The same hearing took the defence of Soytekin himself. Asked whether Sari had been similarly abusive toward him, Soytekin said the prosecutor had not, and instead ordered him meals at each of his testimonies. He testified that early in the case "a politician in Ankara" had called Sari on his behalf, that he knew the politician's identity but did not wish to disclose it, and that Sari and the politician had later fallen out. Pressed later by the bench on the source for his earlier claim that Imamoglu's adviser Murat Ongun had controlled 80 percent of Medya A.S.'s cash flow with only 20 percent representing real work, Soytekin said the figures came from "a statement by someone whose name I do not want to disclose"; the presiding judge asked only whether there was a particular reason for the refusal and got the reply: "He told me while we were talking together." On a separate $1.5 million bribery allegation, the presiding judge interjected: "We are now struggling with dialogue."

Soytekin's testimony has previously been linked to the arrest of Imamoglu's lawyer Mehmet Pehlivan. Sari, the prosecutor whom Imamoglu accused of profane abuse, was previously noted publicly for keeping a "White Toros" model on his desk. The Yetkin Report analysis filing the hearing argued that Imamoglu's decision to record the mistreatment allegations on the court file will become more significant over time, given Turkey's status as a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights -- noting that "torture and ill-treatment" are a central category in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, even at a moment when its rulings are being disregarded domestically.