A 12-year-old girl who was killed on Sept. 28, 2009 while tending sheep near the village of Şenlik in Diyarbakır's Lice district was not killed by a forgotten military mortar shell that exploded in her hands but by an explosive device thrown at her from a distance, a new report from the Council of Forensic Medicine (ATK) has said.

According to the report, released yesterday, a crime scene investigation report and an expert report filed earlier on the death of Ceylan Önkol was inadequate and unscientific. The report said ballistics experts' finding that Önkol had detonated an explosive she found by hitting it against another object was wrong. The Kocaeli ATK re-examined the circumstances of the girl's death after her family claimed that an explosive thrown at Önkol from the nearby Tapantepe Battalion had killed her. The nine-page report from the Kocaeli ATK, prepared by forensic expert Professor Ümit Biçer, asserts that the explosion had occurred without the intervention of the victim and in front of her either on ground level or at a level very close to the ground. The report rules out any intervention from the hand of the victim to an explosive or that the victim was holding an explosive in her hands.Contradictory expert reportsThe new report also states that the investigation report on the scene of the incident had not been prepared objectively and that the expert report on Önkol's death included unscientific comments. The report also notes that Biçer studied the trajectory of 60 mm and 80 mm mortar shells.Professor Biçer also stressed that the autopsy on the body conducted by a general practitioner also involved procedural violations. “Evaluations made in autopsies that might or might not have been conducted in accordance with the procedures in the absence of a forensic expert are inadequate,” Biçer said in his report. “This is why the autopsy carried out [on Önkol's body] is qualified as inadequate and erroneous. The evaluation was made by a single practitioner. They also did not ask for a radiological examination and said a classical autopsy on the body was unnecessary despite the fact that these two are needed to find out how metal particles spread throughout the body. The effect of the blast on the body was established by relying on inadequate evidence and an administrative medical examination that violates procedure. The investigation was carried out two days after the incident. It was also not specified [in the expert report] whether all the evidence had been examined -- or what method had been employed in doing this if all the evidence was examined.”Biçer's report also says that traces of abrasion on the other trees in the area except for two oaks near the site of the explosion and a goat reported dead had not been examined in the explosion experts' report which, despite all the gaps in the initial examination, concludes -- purely based on the wounds on the body -- that the explosion had stemmed from Önkol playing with an explosive with another object in her hand.The report also said that Önkol's face was not facing the center of the explosion at the time of the blast, noting that her head was erect and facing forward. “The reports found no lesions on the subject's back and that not all injuries on the front of the body were caused by entering metal pieces. Considering the distribution of the entry wounds shows that the explosive ammunition did not hit the abdomen or the chest area and that the blast did not happen inside the body. We believe that the explosion occurred in front of the body and at a certain distance from her feet. The evidence also suggests that the person's face was not lowered toward the ground, but facing the other side as the metal pieces hit the body. The lack of ruptured fractures in hands indicates that the metal pieces in the front of the arms suggest that she had assumed a defensive position when she was hit by the metal pieces.”Find those responsibleSerdar Çelebi, a lawyer for the Önkol family, underlined that the report alluded to various contradictions in logs filed by experts. He said the culprits have yet to be found although more than a year has passed since the time of the incident. He demanded a new investigation based on the ATK report.The initial report prepared by bomb exports said that Önkol had accidentally detonated an unexploded grenade previously launched by the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) while playing with it, claiming that the site of the explosion was disrupted by villagers who rushed to the scene after the blast. That report claimed that if mortar shells had hit Önkol, her body would not have remained intact and that there would be an explosion pit in the area. 27 August 2010, FridayTODAY'S ZAMAN  İSTANBUL