Clear answers to the questions on your mind.

Yes. We conduct and report the defence strategy, the preparation for statements and the developments in the file in German or English; and in official proceedings we also take on the coordination of a sworn translator. A team that knows both legal cultures is decisive for foreign managers. This is also a legal right, not merely a service: the Criminal Procedure Code (No. 5271) entitles anyone who cannot defend themselves adequately in Turkish to an interpreter for statements and hearings, at no cost to them. We ma…

As a rule criminal liability is personal. Under the Turkish Penal Code (No. 5237) a manager is punished only for culpable participation in the act — committing it, inciting it or assisting in it — and holding a title, by itself, creates no criminal liability at all.In practice the risk is still real. Where an incident falls inside your duties, your authority or your area of oversight — a transaction carrying your signature, or a process you were expected to supervise — you can be drawn into the investigation as a…

Not in every case. As a rule it is the company’s decision whether to file a criminal complaint, and even where an internal investigation turns up a suspicion of an offence, starting a criminal process is a strategic choice weighed against its commercial, reputational, recovery and evidential consequences. In some files terminating the employment and pursuing damages is the better first move.There are situations where reporting is not discretionary, though. Where money laundering or a suspicious transaction is in p…

Yes. Where a debtor has connections abroad, and to Germany in particular, their assets there can be investigated. In Germany the commercial register (Handelsregister), the land records and company information are accessible to a degree, and can be searched by working in coordination with local colleagues and with the enforcement instruments available there.The real question is turning a finding into a recovery. For a Turkish court or enforcement decision to be applied in Germany it has to be recognised and enforce…

Often, yes. Deleted e-mails and files can frequently be recovered through server backups, mailbox retention windows, shadow copies and forensic imaging of drives, but the window narrows quickly, because systems overwrite freed space over time. That is why preservation should begin the moment a suspicion arises: a legal hold stops routine deletion and log rotation, and forensic imaging captures the data with a verifiable hash so it stands up later. How recovery is carried out also matters. To be usable in court in…

Yes, and it is one of the more useful things to do before deciding to sue; we call it a collectability analysis. Before embarking on an expensive action, enforcement proceedings or arbitration, we build a picture of the debtor’s assets from public and lawfully accessible sources — real property, vehicles, shareholdings, the trade registry, and enforcement and bankruptcy records — and answer the question that actually matters: even if we win, will we be able to collect?This work does not involve obtaining private i…

Under certain conditions yes, but never unconditionally. Examining an employee’s corporate computer or mailbox means processing personal data, so it is bound by the principles of the Personal Data Protection Law (No. 6698): a specific and legitimate purpose, a scope limited and proportionate to that purpose, and an employee who was told in advance. In practice the safe footing is laid at the start of employment, with an IT and acceptable-use policy stating that corporate accounts may be audited and should not be u…

In most cases yes — but as a temporary measure protecting the integrity of the investigation, not as a punishment. The safest route in practice is paid administrative leave that removes the employee’s access to the evidence and to witnesses; because pay and benefits continue, there is no detriment for them to point to.Form and communication are what decide it. The measure should be in writing, for a defined period, reasoned, and worded so that it does not damage the presumption of innocence — and there should be n…

Not by reading them one by one, but through e-discovery. The relevant data sources — mailboxes, shared drives, backups — are first collected and copied securely; the data set is then narrowed in stages by date range, by party or person, and by key concept. Duplicates and irrelevant records are removed, the smaller remaining set is reviewed by a lawyer with a legal eye, and the relevant items are separated into the evidence file.This brings the review down from weeks to days and lowers the risk of a critical record…

It starts with documenting that you are an heir: once the certificate of inheritance is in hand, you have the standing to make enquiries of the institutions holding the records. From there the estate inventory is built systematically — title deeds for immovable property, banks for accounts and safe-deposit boxes, the trade registry and MERSİS for shareholdings, vehicle records, and any receivables owed to the deceased.Where you cannot reach the information yourself, the Turkish Civil Code (No. 4721) lets you ask t…

Identifying the heirs is usually completed within weeks; the estate inventory varies according to the diversity of the assets and institutions' response times. In cross-border files, the apostille and translation chain adds extra time. We set out a realistic timeline at the start, flag the steps that can stretch, and report as we go. One thing is worth knowing in advance: in practice the pace is set by how quickly the land registry, the banks and the consulates answer, and not by how complicated the file is.

It depends on the scope of the review and on where the target company is. A standard counterparty review covering Türkiye alone — registry records, powers of representation, litigation and enforcement history and a basic reputational search — can usually be delivered within a few working days.Files with a German leg, or that need overseas registry searches, deeper financial analysis or verification on the ground, naturally take longer; there, the response times of official bodies and registries usually set the pac…

No; going with a lawyer is strongly recommended. The assistance of defence counsel is a fundamental right under the Criminal Procedure Code (No. 5271), which also guarantees the right to remain silent and the right to be told what you are accused of. In economic crime and corporate matters the first statement largely determines how the file develops: even a technical accounting or contractual concept explained incorrectly or incompletely can be read against you later.Your lawyer works through the file and the like…

For most steps, no. If you grant a power of attorney through the Turkish consulate in Germany — or one drawn up in proper form, apostilled and translated — your lawyer can obtain the certificate of inheritance, search the estate, carry out the land registry and bank transfers, deal with the tax formalities and, where it comes to that, handle a sale. The situations that genuinely require you to attend in person are few, and we tell you about them in advance.Succession in property situated in Türkiye is governed by…

Yes; a statutory period runs for the actual renunciation of the inheritance, and this period must not be missed. An estate investigation is carried out precisely for this decision: we clarify the assets-and-liabilities picture and enable you to make an informed decision to renounce or accept. In an over-indebted estate, official liquidation is also considered. Timing is decisive. The statutory period is three months, and it runs from the point at which the heir learns both of the death and that they are an heir; w…

Yes, where it is done from the right sources and by the right method. Trade registry and MERSİS records, announcements in the Trade Registry Gazette, court and enforcement records and publicly available financial data are open to anyone; gathering and interpreting them is legitimate due diligence, and the Turkish Commercial Code (No. 6102) proceeds on the publicity of the register.The line begins where personal data and information about private life are collected without authority. Monitoring someone’s private li…

Yes, when it is done in the right framework. A creditor investigating a debtor’s assets in order to exercise rights of enforcement and of suit is acting on a legitimate interest, and most of the work runs through legal mechanisms in any case: the enforcement office inquiries available under the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law (No. 2004) — land registry, vehicle and bank searches — together with trade registry and MERSİS records and the court and enforcement files. Once proceedings have been started, the debtor also…

In most fraud matters this is not an either/or. The two routes work better together and in step. The criminal route rests on the offence of fraud in the Turkish Criminal Code (No. 5237); the prosecutor’s investigation makes evidence easier to reach and puts real pressure on the other side. The civil route aims at actually recovering your loss, through a damages claim under the tort provisions of the Turkish Code of Obligations (No. 6098) and the instruments of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law; obtaining a prelim…

Yes; we build a framework that respects the group standard and Turkish law at the same time. In German-headquartered multinationals, investigations usually run to a global protocol — interview formats, document collection, reporting templates, whistleblowing channels. Applying those here means holding two local limits: the employee-protective provisions of the Labour Law (No. 4857) on how interviews are conducted, the prohibition on pressure and the procedure for dismissal; and the rules of the Personal Data Prote…

Yes; verifying a prospective Turkish business partner for a German company is one of the reviews we carry out most often in cross-border trade. It typically covers whether the company is genuinely trading, its trade registry and MERSİS records, its shareholding and representation structure and its authorised signatories, its litigation and enforcement history, any bankruptcy or composition proceedings, and the publicly available financial and reputational indicators.The information is gathered from public sources…

The instrument here is an action to set aside the disposition. Where a debtor has transferred property to a spouse, a relative or someone else close to them in order to put it beyond a creditor’s reach, that transfer can be rendered ineffective as against the creditor under the avoidance provisions of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law (No. 2004) — Article 277 and following. If the action succeeds, the asset can go on appearing in the third party’s name and still be attached and sold for the creditor.Some transfer…

You receive a report that gathers the debtor’s located assets in one place and can be turned straight into an enforcement step. It typically covers immovable property from the land registry, vehicles, findings on bank and financial accounts, company shareholdings and receivables — each with its type, its registration details and, where one can be established, an estimated value.On top of that sits an attachment priority — which asset can realistically be turned into money fastest — and the recommended sequence of…

The report pulls scattered public information about the counterparty into a single decision document. It typically covers the company’s identity, its trade registry and MERSİS records and whether it is genuinely trading; the shareholding structure together with signature and representation powers; the litigation and enforcement history; bankruptcy, composition and attachment records; whatever financial indicators are obtainable; and a press and reputation scan.The records come from legitimate sources — the publici…