— Criminal Law
Article 158/4 was added to the Turkish Penal Code by Law No. 7589 and entered into force on 31 July 2026. Where a person's part in fraud was limited to giving someone else their bank account, card or the details enabling its use, the sentence is halved. It is not an amnesty but a narrow reduction.
The provision arrived with Law No. 7589, publicly known as the 12th Judicial Package. Adopted by the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye on 16 July 2026, it entered into force on 31 July 2026, the day of publication in Official Gazette No. 33326.
The package amends thirteen laws across twenty-eight articles. This piece covers one of them — the fourth paragraph added to Article 158 of the Turkish Penal Code by Article 13. The other fields the office works in are on the practice areas page.
The subject concerns what practice calls account-lending files. People who handed over their account or card, often for a small payment, were prosecuted for the qualified fraud (nitelikli dolandırıcılık) carried out through it. Article 158/4 now governs their position.
The provision can be consulted in the text as published in the Official Gazette.
Article 158/4 halves the sentence where participation in qualified fraud was limited to lending an account or payment instrument. It entered into force on 31 July 2026.
Where participation in the offences under Articles 157 and 158 is limited to giving another person a payment instrument, or the mandatory information enabling use of an account held with a bank, intermediary institution, payment service provider or crypto-asset service provider, to secure an unjust benefit, the sentence is reduced by half.
The scope expressly includes crypto-asset service providers.
The rate is fixed; the court assesses whether the act falls within the paragraph. What the 12th Judicial Package changed for Article 158 is that such conduct now sits in its own paragraph rather than under the general rules on participation.
That assessment turns on the evidence. Files heard in Antalya are assessed by the same standard; the process is described on the criminal defence lawyer in Antalya page.
The contribution must go no further than handing over the account or card. The key phrase is "limited to that act".
It is tested with one question: after delivering the card or details, did the person remain involved? If not, the act qualifies.
The account need not belong to the person: the text covers instruments belonging to oneself or to another.
Where several people are responsible for lending the same account or card, a payment by one covers the others — which matters where many are prosecuted over a single account.
If the person took part in the fraud itself after handing over the account, Article 158/4 does not apply; it was written for those whose contribution stopped at the transfer.
Contacting the victim, directing transfers, withdrawing and passing on the money, or playing a role in an organised structure all go beyond that act; the person is then responsible for qualified fraud under the general provisions.
Where the line falls depends on the evidence — message records, movements of funds, footage and witness statements — so similar-looking files may end differently.
One point deserves emphasis: this is not an amnesty. The conviction is not erased and the record is not cleared; what exists is a narrowly drawn reduction.
Under the new paragraph the person is a principal offender for this offence — described in legal writing as special secondary perpetration.
Before the amendment, practice was divided over whether such a person was a co-principal or an accessory — a distinction that affected the sentence and produced inconsistent outcomes.
Article 158/4 closed that debate: the conduct sits in its own paragraph with a fixed reduction, so the decisive question is whether the contribution was limited to the transfer.
In files not yet final, compensating the victim is not required for the reduction to apply; it is enough that the act falls within the paragraph.
If the person has also benefited from the effective remorse provisions in Article 168, a further reduction may arise depending on the stage at which the loss was made good — a separate item from the halving under 158/4.
Where the person is in pre-trial detention, the effect of the amendment is assessed by the judge or the court and produces no automatic result.
For final convictions a separate transitional regime applies, and here compensating the victim is required — the key difference from pending files.
It covers persons sentenced under Articles 157 or 158 before 31 July 2026 whose file is at the execution stage, to whom Article 168/2 has not been applied, and whose conduct was limited to lending an account or card.
The court that issued the judgment serves a formal notice (ihtar). If within six months the victim's loss is made good in full — by return or compensation — the effective remorse provisions of Article 168/2 may then be applied.
The period runs from the notice, not from entry into force. The loss must be made good in full; until it is, execution cannot be postponed or suspended under this provision.
It also applies to judgments delivered before entry into force that became final afterwards because no appeal was lodged.
| Criterion | File not yet final | Final conviction / execution stage |
|---|---|---|
| Compensation required | Not required | Required; the loss must be made good in full |
| Time limit | Depends on the appellate stage | Six months from the court's formal notice |
| Result | If the act qualifies, the sentence is halved | If the loss is made good, Article 168/2 may apply |
| Effect on execution | No execution, as the file is still pending | Execution cannot be postponed or suspended until the loss is fully made good |
For final convictions the provision is applied through adaptation proceedings (uyarlama yargılaması), held as a hearing.
Courts have begun issuing supplementary decisions under Article 158, but practice is not uniform: some order only suspension of execution and review later, others issue both together.
The request is directed to the court that issued the judgment. Where a final file originates in Antalya, the matter proceeds before that Antalya court.
The process runs through the following steps:
Proceedings may also begin on the prosecutor's application, but a separate written request by the convicted person or their counsel matters, as it sets out why the act qualifies. Payment can be deposited with the court's pay office.
For acts after this date the reduction applies directly where the contribution was limited to lending an account or card.
Where the person did not take part in the fraud itself and the act was limited to lending the account or card, the sentence is halved under the plain wording, even if the conditions in Article 168/1 or 168/2 are not met.
So for later acts, compensation is not a precondition of the reduction; it matters only for the effective remorse provisions.
The most criticised aspect is that it distinguishes between people who committed the same act by the stage their file has reached.
The criticism in legal writing is this: requiring compensation from those already convicted, while not requiring it in files not yet final, sits uneasily with the principle that a more favourable law applies retrospectively — expressed in Article 38/1 of the Constitution, Article 7/1 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Article 7/2 of the Turkish Penal Code, under which the more favourable law is applied and executed.
A further argument: had no separate arrangement been made, Article 158/4 would have applied to final convictions anyway as the more favourable provision. Treating two people in the same position differently by how fast their cases moved is also seen as problematic.
The counter-view: had the legislature provided a higher rate for convicted persons, attaching an extra condition would have raised no legal difficulty.
The debate has a further dimension: the compensation condition does help victims recover their loss. The criticism targets not that but tying different conditions to different statuses.
The matter is not yet settled before the Constitutional Court, so each file is handled within the text in force and the court's assessment.
The questions below concern this provision; more general questions are answered on the frequently asked questions page.
No. This is a narrowly drawn reduction, not an amnesty. The conviction remains and the record is not cleared; only in defined circumstances is the sentence halved.
The rate is fixed by the Law at one half. The court assesses not the rate but whether the act falls within this paragraph.
Six months from the court's formal notice — not from the date the Law entered into force. The loss must be made good in full; a partial payment does not suffice.
The contribution then goes beyond lending the account, so the "limited to that act" condition is not met. The assessment is made on the evidence.
The text expressly lists accounts held with payment service and crypto-asset service providers alongside banks, so it is not confined to conventional bank accounts.
They must be held as a hearing, and decisions are open to objection. Some courts suspend execution first and review later; others issue both decisions together.
Article 158/4 has been in force only briefly, so differences in practice persist. Whether a file falls within the paragraph depends on the act and the evidence.
For files heard in Antalya, the matter proceeds before the court that issued the judgment. Office location and meeting arrangements are on the law office in Konyaaltı page; a file can be assessed via the contact page.