The number of inmates in Turkey’s prisons who were either in pre-trial detention or convicted of a crime was 265,000 in 2018, a 14 percent increase over the previous year, according to data from the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat).
In recent years there has been a significant change between the number of inmates in pre-trial detention and those convicted of a crime. While out of the 128,000 people in Turkey’s prisons in 2011, 27.8 percent were in pre-trial detention, the figure fell to 14 percent in 2014 but increased to 32.2 percent in 2016.
Following a failed coup in July 2016, the Turkish government launched a massive crackdown with mass detentions and arrests, as a result of which more than 600,000 people have been investigated to date on terrorism or coup charges and nearly 30,000 are still in prison.
The TurkStat data also showed that theft was the most frequent crime committed in Turkey in 2018, followed by assault and the sale of illegal drugs.