13-year-old girl shot dead in Ceyhan; aunt and uncle arrested

Thirteen-year-old Melek Göçer was shot in the head at a single-storey house on 362 Sokak in Fatih Sultan Mehmet Mahallesi, Ceyhan, Adana, on November 2 at around 16:30. Her uncle Hüseyin Can Boçkır, his wife Bahriye Güzel Boçkır, and his father Aydın B. had travelled from Mersin to help with the olive harvest.

The family said Melek was wounded in a traffic accident, but doctors found a bullet entry wound above her left eyebrow. She was taken to Ceyhan State Hospital and then to Adana City Hospital for surgery. Melek died on November 5 and was buried at Ceyhan New Cemetery.

“The gun went off all of a sudden.”

Police detained six people, including her father Mehmet Göçer, her uncle Hüseyin Can Boçkır, and his wife Bahriye Güzel Boçkır. The Ceyhan Chief Public Prosecutor's Office launched the investigation after the uncle's account was found to be untrue.

Bahriye Güzel Boçkır later confessed that she fired the weapon. She said she had received death threats from her former husband during divorce proceedings and that the couple kept the gun for protection, bringing it from Mersin to Ceyhan.

She stated that she kept the pistol inside a bedroom mattress so the children could not reach it. On the day of the incident, she took the gun from under the mattress after returning home.

According to Habertürk, she told investigators: "The gun went off all of a sudden." The source also reported that Melek was sitting on a sofa playing with her phone when the weapon discharged.