Pubdate: Mon, 11 Dec 2000 Source: New York Times (NY) Copyright: 2000 The New York Times Company Contact: 229 West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036 Fax: (212) 556-3622 Website: http://www.nytimes.com/ Forum: http://forums.nytimes.com/comment/ Author: Douglas Frantz Note: In the 6th paragraph from the end, it states that drug traffickers would not benefit from the amnesty. THE ATTACKER OF JOHN PAUL COULD GO FREE IN AN AMNESTY ISTANBUL, Dec. 10 — The man who shot Pope John Paul II is among about 35,000 inmates who might qualify for release from overcrowded Turkish prisons under an amnesty bill approved by the legislature. Furthermore, former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, a leader of the country's Islamic movement, would avoid serving a one-year sentence for sedition for challenging the secular government in a 1994 speech. He is supposed to start the sentence next month. Parliament approved the legislation 297 to 72 late on Friday despite deep divisions over the issue. The bill requires the approval of President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, and people close to him said it was not certain that he would sign. By reducing prison sentences by 10 years, the bill would free nearly half of the country's 72,000 inmates. The beneficiaries would include murderers, robbers and hundreds of political prisoners. Some death sentences would also be commuted, though none have been carried out in Turkey since 1984. However, the bill specifies that terrorists will still face the death penalty, which means that Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed Kurdish rebel leader, could be executed. Rapists, corrupt government officials, drug traffickers and people convicted of certain crimes against the state, including Kurdish guerrillas and leftist and Islamic militants, also would not benefit from the amnesty. Whether Mehmet Ali Agca, who shot the pope, would qualify is unclear. He was extradited to Turkey in June after being pardoned in Italy for the 1981 attack in St. Peter's Square in Rome. He had served nearly 20 years in prison. He is now serving a 10-year term for the murder of a newspaper editor in 1979 and is facing trial for armed robbery. His lawyer, Sevket Can Ozbay, told The Associated Press that he would try to get his client released, though Mr. Agca would most likely remain in prison pending a decision in the robbery case. While the government said the amnesty was necessary to improve conditions, families of crime victims and some human rights advocates criticized the bill. Ayten Arslan assailed the prospect of freedom for a man who stabbed her 20-year-old daughter Nemit to death. The man's 26-year sentence was reduced to 9.5 years, and he would qualify for the amnesty. "I will never forgive him and the state doesn't have the right to forgive him," Mrs. Arslan said at a news conference here before the bill was passed. - --- MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart