EXCLUSIVE

FRAUDSTERS who ripped off Irish investors in a £4 million holiday property scam in Turkey nearly TEN years ago – have finally been handed jail terms in Turkey. But there is a twist!

Irishman Kevin O’Kane and his then partner-in-crime at the time, Kubilay Atmaca and his Hande Bakkal wife, were sentenced last week to three years’ jail each.

This was reduced to two years and eight months each after the criminal court, based in Mugla province, took in various other factors.

All three were found guilty of fraud in their involvement of the Golden Beach Villas development on the outskirts of Didim. Their sentences are now awaiting confirmation by Turkey’s Supreme Court.

But for O’Kane – who was not in court and sentenced in his absence – he is unlikely to see jail time anytime soon unless he returns to Turkey.

One of the few pictures to catch O’Kane and Atmaca together on the Golden Beach Villas complex back in 2005

Mr Akin Batmaz, a solicitor representing O’Kane’s victims and who was present in the Turkish court for the sentencing, told Voices today: “The jail time is a technical calculation of the crimes. The local criminal court’s decision will have to be confirmed by the Supreme Court.

“Justice has been slow in coming. Some nine years after the crimes. But it has come.”

Archive images of Kubilay Atmaca and Hande Bakkal

O’Kane was sentenced back in his native Northern Ireland in 2010 at Belfast Crown Court to four and a half years for his running of the bogus operation.

The one-time oil and coal merchant was convicted of 25 charges of obtaining money and property by deception. He later pleaded guilty to a further 126 similar charges. The charges dated between August 2005 and April 2007.

He portrayed himself as the landowner, builder and developer of the Golden Beach Villas development when, in reality, he owned nothing of the scheme.

A total of 59 people were conned out of over £4m when they thought they were buying villas in the sunshine resort, but – as one witness put it during the trial – O’Kane “didn’t even own a blade of grass” in Turkey, despite putting himself forward as the site landowner.

O’Kane and his Turkish business partner spotted the villas for sale at a knockdown £45,000. They thought they could buy them up and then sell them on to unsuspecting investors at a profit of £30,000 per villa. The scam went wrong, however, when they did not buy any of the properties with the money they had been given.

O’Kane had claimed he, himself, had been duped by a Turkish partner. Back in 2007, Atmaca`s attorney Ferah Kocadon claimed Atmaca had been the victim and had been defrauded by his Irish business partner.

However, at sentencing, Mr Justice McLaughlin said his claims were “preposterous” and he “had stretched his credibility to breaking point”. It was revealed in court that one of O’Kane’s victims, who handed over £75,000, has been left with a monthly bank bill of £600 for the next 17 years.

O’Kane, from Portglenone, was declared bankrupt after civil action was brought by the duped investors.

Today, one of O’Kane’s victims, speaking to Voices on condition of anonymity, said: “We still never got a penny back from him.”