Yavuz Yapicioglu

Case record: Yavuz Yapıcıoğlu

Yavuz Yapıcıoğlu (born 1967) was a Turkish serial killer and arsonist, nicknamed “The Screwdriver Killer”.

Background

Yapıcıoğlu was born in Adana in 1967. He had nine siblings. He claimed his family was unloving. His father married a woman with whom he had an affair, and he was raised by his stepmother.

He finished primary and middle school at the top of the class. He was well liked by his classmates. He left home and dropped out of high school in the tenth grade after a quarrel with his parents. He married, but the marriage lasted only a brief time.

He played football on his school’s team and later for an amateur league club. He started a business in the leather trade but was unsuccessful.

Sometime before 1994, he joined a religious cult in Merter, Istanbul. Because he had no income, he lived with his brother.

The offence

Yapıcıoğlu committed crimes “apparently with little cause”. Police records attributed the deaths of 18 people to him between 1994 and 2002. Eyewitnesses and his relatives suggested as many as 40 victims.

1994 stabbing and escape

In 1994, he stabbed three people to death after one of them wished him good morning.

• The 20-year old Sait Korkmaz died at the scene. Yapıcıoğlu then tried to escape, hijacking a car and killing the driver, Rasim Aydın.

He was apprehended in Avcılar.

Hospitalisation and fires

He was placed in Bakırköy Psychiatric Hospital. While there, he assaulted his roommates and the nurses, and set his ward on fire.

He was released because of a medical report attesting diminished responsibility.

Istanbul stabbing

Later, he interfered in a dispute between a girl and a servant in Istanbul. He ran after the girl and stabbed the servant to death when the servant tried to interfere.

After the killing, he fled to Adana, where he killed three more people without any known cause.

Ankara murder and fleeing after an eyewitness

He boarded a coach in Adana. During a stopover in Ankara, he murdered another man.

He then ran after an eyewitness, caught him, and killed him by cutting his throat.

Çorlu arsons and killings

From Ankara, Yapıcıoğlu went to Çorlu, where his brother owned a shop. He set his brother’s shop on fire because his brother did not give him pocket money. He also set the houses of two other relatives on fire.

He raided his father’s home in Silivri with intent to kill him, but his father defended himself with a pump-action shotgun.

Yapıcıoğlu fled from there to Edremit, where his maternal grandmother lived. Three days later, he killed her by hitting her head with a crystal ashtray, because she had told him something about his mother (her daughter) that he did not like.

His mother died of heart attack two days later, upon learning about the incident.

Second psychiatric finding and continued killings

After another arrest, Bakırköy Psychiatric Hospital again found him to have diminished responsibility. He stayed in a mental hospital for treatment lasting about one year.

Following his release, he continued with his murders. He killed three people and injured two more severely with a screwdriver in Çorlu.

Late at night, he went first to the Çorluspor facility and murdered nightman Hüseyin Yumruk with a screwdriver. Then, he skewered Özcan Karagözoğlu in an industrial zone. Finally, he killed Şakir Temüriçi, whom he met on the street. He threw the bodies in a hole.

Mosque incident and escape

In the early morning hours, he went in Tonguçlar Mosque, wounded the imam, Salih Baş, in his neck with a screwdriver, and escaped.

Investigation and arrest

Yapıcıoğlu was apprehended on December 24, 2002.

After his arrest, his brother Yıldır Yapıcıoğlu stated in an interview with a newspaper that Yapıcıoğlu was responsible also for the unsolved so-called Avcılar murders. Yıldır Yapıcıoğlu also said that Yapıcıoğlu had assaulted and raped women because he hated women due to his unsuccessful marriage. Yıldır Yapıcıoğlu said that Yapıcıoğlu confessed to other killings to him.

Yıldır Yapıcıoğlu said he knew of three more unsolved murders in Istanbul, three in Adana, and two in Ankara, as well as the killing of a soldier. Yıldır Yapıcıoğlu said Yapıcıoğlu, nicknamed “The Screwdriver Killer,” had killed more than forty people, of whom only 18 were identified. He was believed to be the serial killer with the highest known victim count in Turkey.

Trial and court-ordered examination

After his arrest, the court ordered his mental examination by the legal medicine institute. The institute certified in April 2003 that Yapıcıoğlu was fully criminally liable for offences he committed.

The report stated further that he simulated mental disorder.

He was detained in Tekirdağ Prison. During his trial in Tekirdağ on December 25, 2002, he admitted that he could normally speak well and do good, but he sometimes experienced loss of feeling time and place. He added that his killings took place during such episodes.

Sentencing

No sentencing outcome was stated.

Outcome

No final legal outcome was stated. The current status was unknown.

Other details

Yapıcıoğlu set multiple properties on fire, including a ward at Bakırköy Psychiatric Hospital and his brother’s shop in Çorlu.

He killed Sait Korkmaz in 1994, hijacked a car during an escape attempt and killed Rasim Aydın, killed a servant in Istanbul, killed three more people in Adana, murdered another man in Ankara, killed an eyewitness by cutting his throat, set his brother’s shop on fire in Çorlu, set the houses of two other relatives on fire, raided his father’s home in Silivri with intent to kill him, killed his maternal grandmother in Edremit, and continued attacking victims with a screwdriver in Çorlu, including Hüseyin Yumruk, Özcan Karagözoğlu, and Şakir Temüriçi. He wounded the imam Salih Baş in the Tonguçlar Mosque with a screwdriver and escaped.