A death on the road in Türkiye, and the file that opens the same night.

Turkish law does not have a dedicated road-death offence. A fatal collision is prosecuted under the general article on causing death by negligence — taksirle öldürme, TCK 85. The Highway Traffic Act (Karayolları Trafik Kanunu, Law no. 2918) supplies the standard of care that was breached; the Penal Code supplies the sentence.

Which court

The range also decides the courtroom. Under Article 12 of Law no. 5235, the ağır ceza mahkemesi hears cases carrying more than ten years' imprisonment. A TCK 85/1 file sits in the asliye ceza mahkemesi; a TCK 85/2 file goes to the ağır ceza mahkemesi, with a three-judge bench and a different pace.

TCK 22 defines taksir as bringing about the result described in the offence through a breach of the duty of care and attention, without having foreseen it. Where the driver did foresee the result but did not want it, that is bilinçli taksir — conscious negligence — and under TCK 22/3 the sentence for the negligent offence is increased by one third to one half.

Two further rules matter in road files. Under TCK 22/4 the sentence is set according to the offender's degree of fault. Under TCK 22/5, where several people are negligent, each is liable for his own fault and each sentence is fixed separately. A collision with two careless drivers does not produce one guilty party and one victim by default.

Where the argument actually happens

Speed, a red light, overtaking where overtaking is prohibited, driving after being awake for twenty hours, driving with a known brake fault — these are the facts that get characterised as conscious rather than ordinary negligence. Alcohol is the most common of them, and it is dealt with in the next section.

The one provision that reduces or removes the penalty

TCK 22/6 covers the case where the result of the negligent act has harmed the offender so severely in personal and family terms that a penalty becomes unnecessary — a driver whose own child or spouse died in the car. No penalty is imposed. Where the negligence was conscious, the sentence may instead be reduced by between one half and one sixth.

KTK 48 prohibits driving under the influence of alcohol or of narcotic or stimulant substances. Two paragraphs matter immediately after a fatal collision.

Under KTK 48/3, where a driver is involved in an accident causing injury or death, examination is compulsory. A driver who disputes the roadside device or refuses to use it is taken to a forensic medicine institution, a forensic physician or a Ministry of Health facility, and blood, saliva or urine samples are taken. Under KTK 48/4, where a person has died or is too badly injured to breathe into the device, samples are taken in the same way.

Where the criminal consequence attaches

KTK 48/6 provides that a driver found over 1.00 promille is additionally subject to TCK 179/3 — endangering traffic safety, six months to two years' imprisonment. KTK 48/7 provides that where a driver above 0.50 promille in a private car, or above 0.20 promille in any other vehicle, causes an accident, the relevant provisions of the Penal Code apply in addition.

The practical effect is not the fine. It is that a recorded reading is the single most reliable route by which a prosecutor argues conscious negligence under TCK 22/3 — and, through it, everything set out in the callout above.

KTK 81 lists what a person involved in a collision must do: stop immediately without creating further danger, take the safety measures the scene requires, leave the position of the vehicles and the traces undisturbed where they bear on responsibility, give identity, address, licence, registration and insurance details on request, notify the authorities, and not leave the scene before they arrive or without their permission.

Under KTK 81/3, a driver who leaves the scene of an accident involving injury or death without the permission of the police, other than out of necessity, is liable to one to three years' imprisonment, and the driving licence is withheld for two years. A 46,000 TL administrative fine applies in addition, and it is not an alternative to the prison sentence. The same paragraph imposes that fine on any driver who leaves the scene without permission outside a case of necessity — material damage, injury and fatal accidents alike, where the parties have not settled between themselves — and equally on a driver who altered the position of the vehicles and the traces contrary to KTK 81/1-b. A licence withheld under this paragraph is only returned once every administrative fine imposed under the Act has been paid in full.

Separately, TCK 98 penalises failing to help a person who cannot manage for himself, or failing to report the situation to the authorities at once: up to one year's imprisonment or a judicial fine, and one to three years where the person dies as a result of that failure.

Why this catches foreign drivers disproportionately

Two patterns recur. A driver who does not speak Turkish walks away to find someone who does, or follows an ambulance to hospital without telling anyone at the scene. Neither is intended as flight; both are recorded as departure from the scene. If you have to move — to get help, to avoid a second collision — say so to the first officer, and ask for the reason to be written into the record. Necessity is a defence in the article. It is much harder to establish for the first time three months later.

Under KTK 83, a traffic accident is taken over by the general police for the criminal side and by the traffic police for the purpose of establishing how it happened and drawing up the trafik kaza tespit tutanağı — the accident report. Where a fatal accident, or one causing life-threatening injury, has closed the road, the same article allows the road to be reopened before the prosecutor arrives — but only where three conditions hold together: the accident is affecting life, property and traffic safety, no other road can be given passage, and it is understood that the prosecutor will be delayed. Where they do hold, the police mark the traces, move the vehicles and the deceased aside, record the position in a report, and reopen the road. Whether those three conditions were in fact met is itself a question the defence can put.

That is the sentence to sit with. Within hours the scene stops existing. What remains of it is a diagram, a set of measurements and a set of photographs taken by people who were not looking for your defence.

Fault, and how it is fixed

KTK 84 lists twelve situations in which a driver is treated as primarily at fault — among them running a red light or an officer's stop signal, entering a carriageway used by oncoming traffic, rear-end collision, overtaking where overtaking is prohibited, wrong turning manoeuvres, straying across a lane, and failing to give priority at junctions. Where more than one driver did one of these things, or where the accident arose from some other breach, the fault ratio is set under the regulation.

The ratio is then produced by an expert. Under KTK 83, traffic police may be appointed as experts; in practice the file usually also carries a report from a court-appointed bilirkişi, and in contested cases from the Adli Tıp Kurumu. Speed is reconstructed from marks and damage. The report is the document the sentence is built on.

The range in TCK 85 is a starting point. Several provisions move from there, and each has a condition.

• Discretionary reduction (TCK 62). Where there are grounds in the offender's favour — his history, his conduct after the act and during the proceedings, the likely effect of the sentence on his future — the sentence is reduced by up to one sixth. The article adds that formal courtroom behaviour designed to influence the court is not to be taken into account.
• Conversion to a judicial fine (TCK 50/4). A sentence for a negligent offence may be converted to a judicial fine even if it is long, where the other conditions are met — but not where the negligence was conscious.
• Suspension (TCK 51). Available for sentences of two years or less, where the person has not previously been sentenced to more than three months for an intentional offence and the court is satisfied he will not offend again. Suspension may be made conditional on the loss being fully made good, and until it is, the sentence continues to be served. The supervision period is one to three years and cannot be shorter than the sentence.
• Deferral of the announcement of the judgment (CMK 231). Available for sentences of two years or less, where there is no previous conviction for an intentional offence, the court is satisfied the person will not reoffend, and — this is the operative condition — the loss caused to the victim or to the public has been fully made good by restitution, restoration or compensation. The supervision period is five years. A deferred sentence cannot also be suspended or converted.
• The driving licence (TCK 53/6). On conviction for a negligent offence committed in breach of the care required by traffic rules, the court may order the licence withdrawn for three months to three years, running from completion of the sentence. This is separate from, and additional to, the administrative withdrawal under KTK 48.

There is no mediation route here

Foreign clients frequently ask about uzlaştırma, criminal mediation, because they have read that Turkish law allows a case to be settled with the injured party. CMK 253 lists the offences open to it. Negligent injury (TCK 89) is on the list. Negligent killing (TCK 85) is not. A settlement with the family does not close a fatal-accident file.

What it can do is satisfy the compensation condition in CMK 231 or the condition attached to suspension under TCK 51/2, and it is relevant to the discretionary reduction under TCK 62. That is a real effect, but it operates through the sentence, not by ending the prosecution. A payment by the compulsory motor insurer is not automatically the same thing as the loss having been fully made good for these purposes; the court decides that on the file.

Remand is not presumed — but flight risk is argued

CMK 100 requires strong suspicion resting on concrete evidence and a ground for detention, and forbids detention that is disproportionate to the likely sentence. Paragraph 3 lists offences for which a ground may be presumed. TCK 85 is not on that list. That is a real advantage, and it should be used. The ground actually relied on against a foreign driver is almost always the first one in paragraph 2: concrete facts suggesting he will flee. Address, employment, family in Türkiye, an intention to remain — these are the facts that answer it, and they are answered best at the first hearing before the judgeship, not on appeal.

The travel ban is the real cost

Under CMK 109, judicial control can be imposed instead of detention where a ground for detention exists. The listed obligations include not leaving the country (109/3-a), reporting at set intervals (109/3-b), not driving and surrendering the licence against receipt (109/3-d), depositing a sum fixed by the judge (109/3-f), and providing security for the victim's rights (109/3-h).

Language, and the consulate

Under CMK 202, where a defendant or complainant cannot express himself adequately in Turkish, the essential points of the accusation and the defence are translated by a court-appointed interpreter, and the same applies at the investigation stage. A defendant may also give his oral defence, on the reading of the indictment and on the prosecutor's final opinion, in another language he says he expresses himself better in — using an interpreter he selects from the official list, at his own cost.

Under CMK 95/2, where the person apprehended or held is a foreign national, the consulate of his state is notified unless he objects in writing. Say yes. A consulate cannot defend you and cannot get you out, but it can confirm to a family abroad where you are and which court has the file.

Residence and departure at the end

TCK 59 requires that a foreign national sentenced to imprisonment be reported to the Ministry of the Interior for assessment of removal, once release on probation or conditional release is granted and in any event once the sentence has been served. Article 54 of Law no. 6458 then provides that a deportation decision is taken about those assessed as requiring removal under TCK 59, and separately about those who constitute a threat to public order, public security or public health. Removal is a separate administrative process with its own short deadline, decided under different legislation by a different authority, and it is not answered by the criminal court.