Crimes and forensic investigation in Ottoman periodaccording to the police journal (1913-1922)

The Police Journal is an official and also a police media organ for 1913, when its first issues started to be published, and afterwards. It is an example of the institution's addressing to its members in their own language. The aim of the journal was stated as "to service the enlightenment of the police and advancement of the profession" as of the first issue. The magazine includes a large collection of articles, such as the use of police dogs in the service of the institution, pictures of famous criminals and thieves, writings on the types of crimes and the working procedures of European police organizations. Many problems have arisen in the historical process due to the way people live together. These arising problems have paved the way for the law to enter into social life and the definition of the problems within this framework. In the later stages of history, this situation revealed crime and criminal acts more clearly and methods emerged to struggle with them. With the duty of policing to prevent crime and criminals as one of these methods, the control of the social peace has become one of the important tasks of the state mechanism. As a developed structure also in the Turks, law enforcement forces have been assigned to fight crime and criminals since the early periods of history. In the modern era, both the position and responsibility of the law enforcement forces have increased exponentially and become an important and strategic institution with the effect of highly intensified and intricate social structures. These institutions have had their own functioning structure and organizations. One of the most important units of this organization has been education and information activities. They've carried out some of these information activities with their own newspapers and journals. Our issue, the Police Journal, has emerged as a result of this activity. The most important subject of the thesis will be the methods of struggling with crimes, criminal rulings, crimes under the title of crimes for police investigation, and judicial issues, which gather under various crimes and forensic investigations reflecting on the Police Journal. The Police Journal began to be published by the Directorate of Public Security, which replaced the Zaptieh Surveillance in August 1909. Published every 15 days, the journal later continued to be issued by the Directorate of Police Journal and maintained its publication life in Istanbul until 1924. After 1930, it was transferred to the Ankara Security Directorate and published by this directorate until 1937. The Police Journal published today is the continuation of this journal. In this study, we will examine the types of crimes and methods of struggling with these crimes included in the Police Journal. In addition, we will reveal the quantitative and qualitative changes that occur in crimes through crime statistics. The main source of our study is the Police Journal. Moreover, other academic resources supporting our study were also utilized. In this study, we will touch upon the changes in the types of crimes and the penalties against the crimes by establishing a link between the past and the present.