Steal a Kiss, Eight Years in Jail

(Vatan Newspaper, 15 January 2011)

The incident in question occured on the 7th of June 2008 in the
Ertuğrul Gazi neighborhood of Palandöken district of Erzurum
province. According to claims, N.Z. started to go back upstairs
from her apartment house's ground floor after having shaken out
a table cloth outside the building. At the same time, N.T., who
lives on the fourth floor of the same building, was hurriedly coming
down the staircase and when he encountered his neighbor N.Z. he
pressed her up against a wall, caressed her cheeks, kissed her
on the lips and went on his way.

N.Z. then filed a complaint about N.T., saying in her statement
that she was frozen by fear. N.Z. stated that 'when N. kissed me
I told my husband and he told me to go and tell N.T.'s wife G.T.
about the incident so I did. G.T. said to me 'God damn that jerk!
His friends went to Mecca for the haj. He sold his car but he couldn't
go so he was crying in the house. Then he ran out to noon prayers
and while leaving the building he did this to you.''  N.Z. added that
'I'm psychologically upset because of this incident. I filed a suit
against N.T.'  Subsequently, the public prosecutor opened a case
about N.T. in Erzurum's 3rd Serious Crimes Court.

As the case proceeded, N.Z. was sent to Istanbul's Forensic
Medicine Center for a determination of her psychological state.
In its report of 30 March 2009, the Sixth Special Council decided
that N.Z.'s mental health had been disturbed by the incident with
N.T. who was then found guilty by the court committee and
sentenced to 10 years in prison. The sentence was reduced to
8 years 4 months for good behavior but N.T. objected to the
decision, declaring that 'as I went down the staircase my arm
touched N.Z.'s arm and she insulted me. Actually, I'm the one
who has a complaint about her!'