Per AİHM case file, on 26th September 1997, the vehicle of Orhan Eren, a correction officer at the Lice Prison and his wife Zozan Eren, a midwife at the public hospital, was found abandoned on the Lice-Diyarbakır road without any sign of accident. During the investigation, it was established that the couple had left their house at 8 am that morning and had passed through a checkpoint at 09.55 am. Orhan Eren’s father and a relative of his stated that they suspected the involvement of a family of village guards and security officers, with whom the family had previously clashed, some members of the family going as far as to threaten Zozan Eren and use their connections to have her transferred to another city for public service.

The investigation launched by the Prosecutor’s Office lagged for years, with some of the witnesses pointed out by the Eren family not being contacted for years, others, including the suspect they named, not being contacted at all.

In 2006, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Turkey had violated the articles 2 (right to life) and 13 (right to effective remedy) of the Convention.

The remains of the couple have not been found.