The contractor responsible for the construction of a building in southern Turkey, in which 96 people died during the powerful earthquake of February 6, 2023, was sentenced Friday to 865 years in prison, the official news agency reported Anadolu.
The 14-story building, located in the large city of Adana, collapsed under the effect of the 7.8 magnitude earthquake, which occurred at 4:17 a.m., which left more than 53,500 dead in Turkey and nearly 6,000 in neighboring Syria. Only one of its residents had survived.
According to the Turkish press, the entrepreneur, Hasan Alpargün, convicted on Friday for “causing the death and injury of more than one person with possible intent”, had fled to the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) the day of the earthquake, before going to the police a week later.
The collapse of this residential building, built in 1975, immediately raised serious questions while the city of Adana, located less than 200 km from the epicenter of the earthquake, was generally spared from the violent tremors.
Experts, during the trial, pointed out serious inadequacies in the construction of the columns supposed to support the building, as well as in the quality of the concrete used.
260 people involved in the construction of buildings that collapsed
The contractor defended himself by asserting that the construction had been approved by the authorities.
More than 260 people involved in the construction of buildings that collapsed in the February 2023 earthquake were arrested in the following weeks, some while trying to flee Turkey. Several trials have opened since the start of the year across the country to judge some of these entrepreneurs.
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