No Midnight Express Prison Reform of Turkey on the Way to Europe

When I am lecturing Criminal Law to my second year students at the Istanbul University Law School and I come to the prison sen- tence, I tell them a story about the silver wedding party of a couple. The big cake arrives, but the husband is not there. They find him upstairs in the bedroom in tears. “This is a happy day, why are you crying?” asks a friend. The man answers, “If I had killed this woman 25 years ago, today I would be discharged from prison”. I tell my students that this country could not be Turkey, because no one stays in prison that long. First, provisions of conditional release are applied to all prisoners, whereas only prisoners in good conduct should have this privilege. Second, frequent amnesties result the early release of the offenders. As to harmonise the legal system of Turkey to Europe many recent changes have taken place under the name of Criminal Law reform. The most successful one is the Code of Execution of Pun- ishments and Protective Measures.