The presiding judge ordered Ekrem İmamoğlu out of the courtroom on 2 July 2026, after an argument over how quickly the defense had to finish. It came at the 61st hearing of the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İBB) case.
İmamoğlu is the İBB mayor and the CHP's presidential candidate. He is one of the defendants and denies the charges.
The dispute started over scheduling. The court wanted closing defenses wrapped up by 9 July. İmamoğlu objected, saying he had two other cases the following Monday and two more the week after. "Here we are defending our rights and our law with superhuman effort," he told the court, per Sözcü. "It is not possible for the defenses to be ready by 9 July."
The presiding judge warned him: "Do not carry on like this, or I will have you removed from the room." İmamoğlu answered, "I do not accept it. You will see."
A scuffle broke out between members of parliament and security officers, according to Sözcü. The judge ordered, "Take out the ones who are shouting." İmamoğlu was led from the room and the court recessed.
The confrontation carried on after he left. CHP Diyarbakır MP Sezgin Tanrıkulu urged the judge to reconsider. The judge moved to have him removed too. When MPs refused to leave, gendarmerie officers stepped in.
To CHP deputy chairman Suat Özçağdaş, the judge said: "Gendarme colleagues, what are you waiting for? MP or spectator, it makes no difference. Take them out. You cannot clown around here just because you are an MP." Former CHP MP Aykut Erdoğdu walked out after İmamoğlu.
Özçağdaş rejected the judge's authority afterward. "It is not clear who the presiding judge is," he said, per Sözcü. "He came here as AKP's judicial arm." He said he would answer the judge "before the judiciary."
Tanrıkulu, deputy chair of parliament's Human Rights Inquiry Committee, called the day's measures against İmamoğlu among the most severe used in criminal trials. He argued the defense could not be restricted in a case seeking thousands of years in prison, and that "grave rights violations" had occurred, with fair-trial rules "completely violated." He also called on the justice minister to act over the judge's "clown" remark.
The prosecution's account sits in the indictment. A Haber, reporting its contents, said the İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office names İmamoğlu as the leader of a criminal organization active since 2014. The charges against him include forming an organization to commit crime, bribery, rigging public tenders, fraud against public institutions, extortion, and laundering the proceeds of crime.
Prosecutors are seeking 849 to 2,430 years in prison for İmamoğlu, A Haber reported. The indictment puts the public loss from 143 alleged acts at roughly 160 billion lira and $24 million, plus 95 properties across Türkiye. Everything in the indictment is an allegation, and İmamoğlu denies the charges.
The two outlets differ on the size of the docket. A Haber reported 407 defendants in total; Sözcü put the figure at 414. Both said 59 of them are in detention, after the release of others earlier in the proceedings.