Shmuel’s Trial

When I returned to the shop, a telegram from Van was waiting. My relative Shmuel Kutler¹, whom I respected greatly, had written from prison: “I am in trouble. Come quickly.” I left my work and set out for Van at once.

Shmuel ran a large wholesale and retail shop. Under the National Protection Law, merchants were forbidden to raise controlled prices for essential goods. A long-standing customer asked for a full tin of kerosene. Since the shop sold it only in small quantities, he agreed to pay the retail price for several containers. The moment he left, police entered: the customer was a government agent and the purchase a trap.

Shmuel was accused of charging eighteen lira instead of the wholesale price of seventeen. Statements were taken and he was held until trial. His shop remained closed; relatives in town refused to open it for him. I stayed at his home that night. His wife, Baji Kutler², offered ten beşibirliks—large gold coins³—for me to take to the public prosecutor, Kemal Bey.

Kemal refused even to touch the gold and declared that he took no bribes, though he hinted that he would minimise the offence in court. I returned the coins. Baji burst into tears, and I too distrusted his intentions. We retained Ali Rıza Bey, a lawyer of Laz background⁴ about seventy years old and a former chief judge in Van. If the matter ended in one hearing, he would receive five thousand lira.

At the trial Shmuel entered between two guards. The prosecutor read the charge and demanded conviction. Ali Rıza rose and said angrily, “Everything my colleague has said would not fill a nutshell.” The prosecutor protested. The defence reminded the court that he had presided there for six years, provisionally withdrew the remark, and asked that they first deal with the man who had suffered an injustice and only afterwards with the quarrel between lawyers.

After a brief recess, Shmuel was fined ten thousand lira, barred from trade for two years, and sentenced to exile in Hakkari. Ali Rıza advised an appeal in Ankara but admitted that his own involvement might harm it. We needed, he said, to send an intelligent person to pursue the prosecution papers constantly and prevent the case from languishing.

Shmuel said he had no one to trust but me. I was authorised to spend what was needed, retain a famous lawyer, and above all cancel the exile. The appeal went to Ankara, and I flew after it with his neighbour Kasım, a Laz. We stayed at the Karadeniz—the Black Sea—Hotel.

We asked for the city’s most celebrated lawyer and were directed to Hamit Şevket.⁵ While waiting, we overheard him charge a wealthy woman two thousand lira. He wanted ten thousand from us for the appeal and another ten thousand if he had to travel to Van for a retrial. When we said we would consider it, he remarked that there was to be no “Jewish bargaining” in his office.

Outside, Kasım told a parable. Two friends disputing whether smoking invalidated the Ramadan fast meant to ask a hoja, but met the mufti—a higher religious authority⁶—who promptly ruled that it did. The smoker conceded, but said he had not meant to consult the highest-ranking man. We too, Kasım explained, had gone straight to the most expensive lawyer.

We continued searching and found Saim Dora⁷, a large, amiable lawyer. Strangers would be asked for excessive sums everywhere, he warned, but he would act once the power of attorney arrived. His fee would be only the taxi and filing costs. We wired Van urgently. Kasım continued to Istanbul; I remained in Ankara, visiting the post office and Ministry of Justice every day.

One day at the ministry I happened upon Ali Hakim Rıza, a judge I knew from Başkale. He greeted me warmly, introduced me proudly to his colleagues, and insisted that I leave my hotel and share his room. The next morning he pointed out the home of a man who had helped many people. “Ring the bell and ask for Osman Bey. Do not lose courage.”

Dr Osman, a physician of about fifty, received me at home. I told him of the trial and my efforts in Ankara. He asked me to write the whole story and bring several copies. The next day he took the paper and said, “Sleep in peace, but come here every day and ask what is happening.” Twenty judges, he explained, examined appeals from across Turkey; knowing the story beforehand would place this one in a better position.

I called each day for a week. Judge Rıza completed his business and left, and I remained alone. After a week Osman opened the door himself and smiled. “Your man has been free since midnight. He was released without another trial. Go and congratulate him.” I wired Van; Shmuel replied that he was home and would meet me in Istanbul.

I returned to thank Osman and pay him. He pointed to his villa and the apartment building he owned, and told me that his wife was a member of parliament, his daughter a deputy public prosecutor, and he himself physician to the city’s notables. “If I served you, that is my wealth,” he said. When I forced a hundred-lira note on him, he returned fifty and gave fifty to the maid. Meeting me, he added, had changed his opinion of easterners, whom he had imagined as coarse and lawless.

Saim Dora telephoned to ask why the power of attorney had not arrived. I told him that Shmuel had been acquitted and asked what I owed. He refused payment: “I did nothing; how could I charge you? I share your happiness.”

I travelled to Istanbul. In Galata I saw the old tower and located my acquaintance Shimshon Özel⁸, Rafael’s cousin, who was married to my sister. He took me into his home. Shmuel arrived three days later. For a month we explored the city and I met his trading friends. He invited me to join him in Antep to buy dried fruit, but I remained another week in Istanbul and returned to Van.

In Van I was welcomed like a diplomat. Three prominent men had been convicted under the same provision and lost their appeals in Ankara; everyone wanted to know how I had succeeded. After one day I mounted a horse and rode back to Başkale.