A boxer jailed after he stabbed his girlfriend 37 times with a bread knife has been found choked to death in his prison cell.

Officers discovered Selim Ahmet Kemaloglu, 27, hanging by a sheet in his individual cell in Adana F-Type Prison, southern Turkey at around 8am on 30th October.

His body was taken to Adana Forensic Medicine Institute for an autopsy before being handed over to his family for burial.

His cause of death was ruled as suicide.

The 1st Penal Chamber of the Supreme Court had confirmed Kemaloglu’s minimum non-parole term of 24 years behind bars for murder on 22nd October.

He had argued violently with his girlfriend Zeynep Senpinar, 24, at his home in Mentese district, Mugla Province, south-west Turkey on 24th May 2020.

He had then grabbed a bread knife from the kitchen and stabbed her 37 times in the chest.

Paramedics who arrived on the scene could only pronounce Zeynep dead, and Kemaloglu, who had also injured himself in the bloodbath, was taken to hospital.

The pair’s relationship had all but ended a month before the killing, but the couple had continued to see one another.

Zeynep had reported Kemaloglu to the police two weeks before she died saying he had beaten her.

Kemaloglu already had a long criminal record with 14 convictions.

He had last been taken into custody on 28th August 2019 for sexual assault and deliberate injury.

After being treated in hospital, Kemaloglu was charged with Zeynep’s murder.

Femicide is a growing problem in Turkey, particularly after the country officially quit the Istanbul Convention in July last year.

According to the 2021 Annual Data Report announced by the ‘We Will Stop Femicide Platform’, 280 women were killed by men in 2021, while 217 women were found suspiciously dead.

According to data from the ‘Monument Counter’, which is “a digital memorial for women killed by violence” and is updated daily, 331 femicides have taken place in Turkey so far this year.