Four Turks have been sentenced to nearly 90 years in prison each after they were found guilty of lethally poisoning five Russian tourists in 2011 with bootleg alcohol, a lawyer for the victims' families said today.
A court in southwestern Turkey convicted the four yesterday on charges of "manslaughter" over their involvement in producing and selling counterfeit alcohol, lawyer Kader Ruhittin told AFP.
Thirty Russian tourists were hospitalised after drinking the fake alcohol on a yachting trip near the resort town of Bodrum in May 2011. Five Russians died.
An investigation showed high doses of methanol, commonly used to mix bootleg alcohol, in blood samples from the victims and the seizure of some 200 bottles of counterfeit drinks on vessels operated by the same yachting company.
Three other accomplices were sentenced to seven and a half years in prison and another suspect was acquitted, the lawyer said.
The incident sounded alarm in Turkey's flourishing tourism sector, a vital source of income.
Turkish authorities have since drawn up tighter measures to combat bootleg alcohol and carried out several raids on suspected suppliers.
In 2009, 11 people, including three German students, died in Turkey after drinking bootleg spirits and 22 died in 2005 after consuming adulterated raki, a powerful, anise-flavoured spirit.
Many have blamed the emergence of illegal stills on hefty taxes levied on alcoholic beverages by Turkey's Islamist-rooted government since it came to power in 2002.
