Story By: Feza Uzay, Sub-Editor: Marija Stojkoska, Agency:  Newsflash

A young woman attacked with a knife by her boyfriend told him “you’re not a person like that” and “please, help me” before asking him to kiss her before she died, according to harrowing testimony by a neighbour who heard them arguing.

The boyfriend, who went on the run after stabbing her, which included at some stage cutting her throat, has now been charged with murder.

The young woman, Sebnem Sirin, 25, was allegedly killed by boyfriend Furkan Zibinci, 25, in the neighbourhood of Kinikli, in the district of Pamukkale, in the south-western Turkish province of Denizli at 6am on 27th October.

She was confirmed dead at the scene by paramedics, who found her slumped in a pool of blood on the living room floor.

Her body was taken to the morgue at the Pamukkale University Hospital Forensic Medicine Institute for an autopsy.

Police started an investigation into the incident and Zibinci, who went on the run, was later caught.

After the investigation was completed, the Denizli Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office prepared an indictment against Zibinci.

The prosecutor stated that Zibinci planned to kill his girlfriend and that there was a note in the notes section of his mobile phone allegedly stating that he planned to kill Sebnem while she was asleep.

It was stated in the indictment that the accused stabbed the victim several times while she was sleeping.

The indictment also stated that after killing Sebnem, the accused fled the scene and deleted all the potentially incriminating data from his mobile phone.

According to the indictment, the defendant’s father, Ismail Zibinci, said in his statement: “My son called me. He said ‘Dad, I’m in trouble. Come quickly. We need to talk, I killed my girlfriend’.

“When I went to him, he asked for help saying, ‘I killed my girlfriend, she is in the apartment now. Take me out of here, help me’. When I looked at the apartment, there was a woman covered in blood. I saw her, and I immediately called the emergency services.”

A man identified only as Viktoriy, who is reportedly a foreign national living in Turkey, was staying in an apartment in the same building on the day of the incident. He said in a statement filed along with the prosecutor’s indictment that he had heard the couple at around 3am. He said: “Furkan was saying, ‘I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.’

“At around 6am, first I heard the woman scream. And then I heard her crying and saying: ‘Furkan, please, don’t do that, you’re not a person like that. Please, help me’.”

Viktoriy added: “I heard nothing for a little while. Later I heard Sebnem saying ‘Let me kiss you one last time before I die’. The voices stopped. The police came to the scene at around 6.10am, however, they left after they knocked on the door many times, but no one answered.”

Prosecutors have requested that the defendant be sentenced to 30 years in prison for 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 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’, an online monument established to keep alive the memory of the women who died from gender violence in Turkey that is updated daily, 36 femicides have taken place since the beginning of 2022.