Istanbul's 18th Heavy Penal Court acquitted all 13 defendants in the controversial “Odatv trial” on April 12. Odatv is a staunchly secular news website in Turkey that got into trouble in 2010 with the followers of the Pennsylvania-based preacher Fethullah Gulen in the judiciary and national police department — a network that many Turks refer to as the Fethullah Gulen Terror Organization, or FETO.
Originally composed of 14 defendants — Kasif Kozinoglu, a high-ranking official in Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, died in 2011 — the Odatv suspects were charged with being a front for the alleged Ergenekon network. Even though Turks of all political stripes had suspected for years that a “deep state” structure often sowed chaos and disorder in their country — carrying out assassinations and false flag operations in order to undermine and overthrow democratically elected governments — the Ergenekon trials became infamous for evidence tampering, late-night arrests, secret witnesses and denial of defense.