Convicted in Türkiye While You Were Abroad: the two applications you must make

The starting rule is restrictive. Article 193/1 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CMK) provides that, save where the law makes an exception, no hearing is held in the absence of the defendant, and a defendant who stays away without a valid reason is brought by force. The exceptions are narrow, and they account for nearly every absentia conviction of a foreign national.

The first is Article 194/2. A defendant who has been questioned once and then absents himself, or fails to appear at the hearing following an adjournment, may have the case concluded in his absence if the court no longer considers his presence necessary. This is the ordinary path: you gave your statement, you were released, you went home, and the trial continued without you.

The second is Article 195. Where the offence carries only a judicial fine or confiscation, alone or together, the hearing may proceed even if you do not attend — but only if the summons stated in terms that it would.

The third is Article 247. A person who conceals himself in Türkiye or is abroad so that the investigation or prosecution comes to nothing may be declared a fugitive (kaçak), but only where the investigation or prosecution concerns one of the offences listed in Article 248/2; there the summons is published in a newspaper and posted on the door of his known residence, and he is declared a fugitive if 15 days pass without him coming forward. Proceedings may then run against him. But if he has never been questioned, no conviction may be entered against him; Article 193/2 points the same way, allowing a case to be closed in absence without questioning only where the decision required is something other than a conviction, a decision that no penalty be imposed, or a security measure.

Then comes the step that decides your deadline. Article 35/2 CMK requires a judgment open to a legal remedy to be served on a party who was not present. Service abroad goes through the competent authority of the country where you live (Tebligat Kanunu art. 25). If no address can be found, the court orders service by publication in a newspaper, a news site and the Press Advertising Agency portal, with the papers also posted at the courthouse (arts. 28 and 29) — and that service is deemed complete seven days after the last publication, extendable by the court to no more than 15 days (art. 31). Two weeks after that, the appeal period has closed and nobody has told you anything.

Article 274 CMK is written for precisely this situation and is unusually blunt about it. A defendant may seek restoration of time against a judgment given in his absence; the appeal period continues to run while he does so; where he asks for restoration, he must lodge an appeal as well; and matters connected with the appeal are held over until the restoration request is decided.

So a restoration petition on its own leaves you with a final conviction and no appeal on the file. An appeal on its own is rejected as out of time. Both go in together.

Article 40/1 states the test: a person who has missed a period through no fault of his own may seek restoration. Article 40/2 adds a rule that carries real weight here — a person is also deemed to be without fault where the right of appeal was never notified to him. Article 231/2 obliges the court to state the remedy, the forum and the period to the defendant who is present. If you were not there, you were not told.

Article 41/1 fixes the period at two weeks from the removal of the impediment, not from the date of the judgment. The impediment ends on the day you actually learn of the conviction: a passport check at the border, a bank query, a consulate refusing a document, a notice surfacing at a third-country airport. Article 41/2 requires you to set out the facts showing the absence of fault and to attach any documents — entry and exit records, proof of residence abroad, evidence about the address the court used. Its closing sentence is the operative one: the procedural act that could not be performed is performed at the moment the petition is filed. That act is the appeal.

Two further points. Under Article 42/2 a decision granting restoration is final, while a refusal may be challenged by objection. Under Article 262, your legal representative or your spouse may exercise the remedies open to you, in their own right and within the period — which can matter when entering the country is not safe.

Istinaf lies against judgments of the first-instance courts (Article 272/1), and a sentence of fifteen years or more is examined by the regional court of appeal of its own motion. Three categories are closed off by Article 272/3: convictions to a judicial fine of 15,000 Turkish lira or less as finally determined, other than fines converted from a prison sentence; acquittals for offences whose judicial fine does not exceed 500 days at its upper limit; and judgments the law declares final.

In an absentia case the argument is usually Article 289/1(h): restriction, by decision of the court, of the right of defence on matters important to the judgment. That is one of the absolute grounds of unlawfulness, which the appeal court takes into account even if the petition does not raise it. Where it is established, Article 280/1(e) requires the regional court to quash the judgment and return the file to a first-instance court to be examined and decided afresh. In other cases the regional court may take the trial over itself and begin hearing preparations under Article 280/1(g).

Attending that hearing matters. Under Article 282/1(f), if the summons was served and you do not come, the regional court may read out your earlier questioning record and conclude the case in your absence. The protection is in the same provision: if the sentence to be imposed would be heavier than the one given at first instance, you must be heard in every case. Against the regional court's judgment, the period for temyiz is again two weeks from service of the reasoned decision (Article 291/1).

If restoration is refused, or was never sought, the judgment stands and is enforced. What remains is retrial. Article 311 lists the grounds, and two are realistic here. Sub-paragraph (e) covers new facts or new evidence which, alone or together with the material already before the court, would require acquittal or the application of a lighter provision. Sub-paragraph (f) covers a finding by the European Court of Human Rights that the conviction was given in breach of the Convention; there, the request must be made within one year of that judgment becoming final. The petition goes to the court that gave the judgment, which decides admissibility without a hearing (Article 318).

One route is built into the fugitive provisions themselves. Under Article 247/3, where a security measure has been imposed on a fugitive who was never questioned, he or his counsel may seek reopening of the trial on the footing that the right of defence is now to be exercised.

Until something is set aside, the consequences continue to run: an arrest warrant, detention ordered in your absence under Article 248/5, seizure of assets held in Türkiye in the offence categories listed in Article 248/2, an entry in the criminal record, and frequently an Interpol red notice that makes any border crossing a risk. Which route is open to you, and in what order, turns on when and how the judgment was served. Those questions sit alongside the ordinary remedies set out on appeals in Türkiye: istinaf and temyiz.