Time out
To briefly explain the statute of limitations, it is a criminal law institution that results in the state waiving its right to punish and the criminal case being dismissed, if a lawsuit has not been filed even though a certain period of time has passed since the crime was committed, or if the lawsuit has not been concluded within the legal period despite being filed.
Penalty statute of limitations is the cessation of execution of the sentence after a certain period of time has elapsed from the finalization of the conviction.
In the statute of limitations, the state’s right to punish is eliminated, but the sentence rendered in the statute of limitations cannot be executed.
There are two types of statute of limitations. Ordinary statute of limitations and extended statute of limitations. The difference here is that there is a factor that causes the timeout to be interrupted. In this case, the ‘prolonged statute of limitations’ applies to the suspect or the accused. TCK art. According to Article 66, the ordinary statute of limitations for the mildest crimes is 8 years and the extended statute of limitations for the same offenses is 12 years.
According to the Turkish Penal Code, the statute of limitations is determined by taking into account the upper limit of the penalty determined in the law for each crime. In other words, first the upper limit of the crime is found, according to the upper limit of the crime, TCK art. It is determined whether the statute of limitations, regulated in 66/1, has expired. If the upper limit of the penalty in the law is not clear, TCK art. According to Article 49, the upper limit for term imprisonment is considered to be a maximum of 20 years.
If the penalty for the crime is optionally determined in the law as “imprisonment or judicial fine”, the upper limit of the prison sentence is taken into account when calculating the statute of limitations, even if the accused is given a judicial fine in the conviction decision. The penalty for the crime is calculated by taking into account the upper limit of the prison sentence, among the penalties imposed together as “imprisonment penalty and judicial fine”.
However, when the evidence in the file is taken into consideration, if it is seen that the qualified forms of the crime that require more severe punishment may have been committed during the evaluation by the court, the statute of limitations for the case is determined by considering the qualified form of the crime (TCK art. 66/3).
Qualified forms of crime, which are regulated only by increasing the basic form, will also be taken into account when calculating the statute of limitations.
The point to be considered here is that only the qualified cases of the crime that require a heavier penalty are taken into account when calculating the statute of limitations. In other words, if there are qualified cases of the crime that require less punishment, they are not taken into account when determining the statute of limitations.
