The extradition of Eylem Tok, the mother of a 17-year-old dual Turkish-US citizen accused of causing a fatal car accident in İstanbul and fleeing to the US, has gained momentum as the US State Department has found both of Tok’s offenses in Turkey’s original request to be “extraditable” under a bilateral treaty, Voice of America’s (VOA) Turkish service reported on Thursday.
Tok’s son T.C. is accused of driving without a license in İstanbul on March 1 and causing a crash that killed 29-year-old Oğuz Murat Aci and injured four others. Following the accident, T.C. and his mother flew to Egypt and then to the United States. Turkish authorities have requested their extradition.
Turkish novelist and poet Eylem Tok and her son, T.C., were arrested earlier in June pursuant to an extradition request from Turkey as they were about to tour an expensive private school in Boston.
Their arrests were announced on X by Turkish Justice Minister Yılmaz Tunç, who said they were “captured in the United States in line with our extradition request.”
Chief Magistrate Judge Donald Cabell of the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts previously ruled that T.C. will remain in custody as the extradition process continues. The judge said he needed more time to review the extensive documents presented by both the defense and the prosecution before deciding on a bail request.
Requests for Tok, who is also facing extradition proceedings, and her son are being processed separately. Tok’s next status conference, which was initially scheduled for June 27, was postponed to July 1.
According to VOA Turkish service, Tom Heinemann, a legal advisor with the US Department of State, on Tuesday sent a letter addressed to Kristen Kearney, assistant US attorney at the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts, about Tok’s extradition.
Heinemann said the Department of State has determined, based on new information informally received from the Turkish government, that both offenses for which Turkey originally requested Tok’s extradition meet the relevant requirements under a 1980 treaty between the two countries.
Heinemann said that after initially assessing that only the charge of “protecting an offender” should be forwarded to the court for its consideration, the department found the new information provided by Turkey in support of its request “sufficient” to forward the offense of “destroying, concealing or altering evidence” to the court for consideration as well.
The letter further states that once Turkey formally submits the new information to the department through diplomatic channels as required by the treaty, a new declaration will be signed, making clear that the department believes that both offenses are “extraditable” under the treaty.
The US is not obligated to extradite its citizens under the treaty.
Meanwhile, Martin G. Weinberg, one of T.C.’s lawyers, responded to the prosecution’s petition claiming that a $2 million property in Turkey offered by the defendant’s father as a bail guarantee did not meet the conditions for his release on bail.
Weinberg underlined that T.C.’s father is ready to fulfill the conditions of his son’s bail and any other conditions that the court believes are necessary for his son to be released on bail, including depositing $200,000 in cash as a bond.
His lawyer said that if T.C. is released, he will be under the care and supervision of his relatives in Massachusetts and that all his needs will be seen to. He added that if the court deems it necessary, it may put T.C. under house arrest and confiscate his passport.
According to a special report by the Medyaradar news website last week, T.C. attempted suicide while in a Connecticut juvenile detention center. The defense team claimed that T.C. faced harsh conditions at the facility, had difficulty accessing necessary medication and experienced severe psychological stress.