Yavuz Yapıcıoğlu is one of a small number of men in Turkey whose name is attached to a long list of deaths that the courts have only partly examined. What is firmly on record is narrow: three men died in Çorlu, in Tekirdağ province, on December 23, 2002, and in March 2004 the Tekirdağ Heavy Penal Court (Ağır Ceza Mahkemesi) was passing sentences in the cases that followed. The wider picture comes from a former police reporter's recollections, published by Habertürk in December 2024. Police records are said to attribute 18 deaths to him; relatives and witnesses are said to claim 43. Neither number is verified.
Habertürk's account begins in 1993 in Merter, an Istanbul district. A fight over a young woman left a young man dead and others injured. A suspect named Yavuz was arrested the next day.
Habertürk also wrote that police suspected the same man in a series of attacks on young women in the Avcılar district in late 1992 and early 1993, two of whom died. The link is not confirmed, and no charge or finding connected to those attacks is on record.
After the Merter arrest he was sent to Bayrampaşa Prison. A report from the Bakırköy Mental and Nervous Diseases Hospital concluded that he lacked criminal capacity; Habertürk quotes the finding as "ceza ehliyeti yoktur" (he has no criminal capacity). He was released on the basis of that report. No trial or verdict for the Merter death is on record.
Accounts place the death of his paternal grandmother at different points. Milliyet, writing in March 2004, says he had been treated at the Manisa Mental and Nervous Diseases Hospital after killing his paternal grandmother in Balıkesir. Habertürk says she was killed after his release on the psychiatric report, and that he went on to further killings. The year is not on record, and no conviction for her death is on record; the outcome described is hospital treatment.
Three men died in Çorlu on December 23, 2002: Hüseyin Yumuk, 45, Özcan Karagözoğlu, and Şakir Temürcü, 44. Two other men were injured the same night, and the court dealt with the attempted-murder charge for one of them.
Later accounts place the deaths elsewhere in the town and give different ages; the ages of 45 and 44 were those stated at the time of the trial.
After the Çorlu deaths he was arrested again. Habertürk says he was sent first back to the Bakırköy hospital and then to Tekirdağ Closed Prison.
The Çorlu trial turned in part on whether he could be held responsible. Habertürk reports that the Forensic Medicine Institution produced conflicting reports and that the Forensic Medicine Council later concluded he was sane and had criminal capacity, a finding Habertürk quotes as "Akıllı ve cezai ehliyeti vardır" (he is sane and has criminal capacity). The date of that finding is not on record. This stands opposite the 1993 finding of no criminal capacity. At the March 2004 hearing a mental condition was alleged to have affected his sanity.
According to Milliyet, he faced five separate cases in Çorlu for murder and for attempted murder. His lawyer, Serkan Ercin, was present at the hearing of March 2004, and Yapıcıoğlu, then 41, was in detention. The paper reports the sentence of that day as 26 years in prison. Earlier in the same proceedings the court had given him 28 years for the death of Şakir Temürcü, and 24 years for one of the attempted-murder cases, which was reduced to 16 years for mitigating factors. Two cases were still pending: one for murder and one for attempted murder. Which victim the 26-year sentence concerned is not on record, and neither are the legal provisions applied or any appeal.
The outcome of the two pending cases and any ruling by the Court of Cassation are not on record.
Habertürk, on December 22, 2024, wrote that he remained in prison.
The figures of 18 and 43 deaths are unofficial. The 18 is described as the number in police records; the 43 is attributed to relatives and witnesses. Neither has been established by a court. The Merter death, the Avcılar attacks and the death of his grandmother are attributed or reported only, and the place of the grandmother's death in the sequence is disputed.
1993: a death in Merter, Istanbul, is attributed to him; he is arrested the next day, sent to Bayrampaşa Prison, then released after a Bakırköy hospital report finding no criminal capacity.
Date not on record: his paternal grandmother dies in Balıkesir; he is treated at the Manisa Mental and Nervous Diseases Hospital.
December 23, 2002: three men die and two are injured in Çorlu; he is arrested.
Date not on record: the Forensic Medicine Council finds him sane with criminal capacity.
March 18, 2004: Milliyet reports a 26-year sentence at the Tekirdağ Heavy Penal Court, after earlier sentences of 28 and 16 years; two cases pending.
December 22, 2024: Habertürk reports that he remains in prison.