Ahmet Babat, a young man whose family has connections among security forces in Turkey’s southeastern province Şırnak, has confessed to killing a 17-year-old girl, reported Mezopotamya News Agency.
Seventeen-year-old Firdevs Babat, who lived in Şenoba town of Şırnak’s Uludere district, had reportedly left the house on Thursday saying she was going to visit a friend.
After being unable to contact her, Firdevs’s family informed the police and gendarmerie of her disappearance. After a two-day search, the police found the body of the young girl in a river between Şırnak and Uludere. An examination found five bullets in Firdevs’s body, along with signs that she had been beaten.
The Şırnak Bar Association said Ahmet Babat had been arrested after he confessed to the crime during a police interrogation.
Ahmet Babat hit Firdev’s head “with a stone or something” said Firdevs’s sister Bişeng Babat in a statement on social media. “My sister fainted, then he fired 5 shots with his brother’s gun, which he brought from the house. He killed Firdevs and threw her into the stream.”
Mezopotamya agency said the gun belonged to Ahmet Babat’s brother, Ramazan Babat, a member of the state-founded arm of the gendarmerie known as the Village Guards.
Locals told the artıGerçek news site that the family was protected because of its political connections. They said the Babat name was strongly associated with historic cases of enforced disappearances and political killings.
Birgün newspaper reported that Ramazan Babat had been detained for raping a young girl three months before Firdevs was killed.
Ramazan Babat was reportedly released after his family paid 200,000 liras ($11,000) in restitution to close the case. However, Firat News reported that he was arrested on 24 August for “sexually assaulting a child”
