Deadly shooting involving two women at Istanbul cafe featured in ‘Cukur’ series

A cafe featured in the popular Turkish TV series Cukur became the scene of a murder following a verbal dispute between two women and a street vendor.

The cafe, known for being the backdrop of numerous notorious criminal scenes in the series, quickly became the focal point of Turkish media, making the murder case one of the top stories.

What happened in Cukur cafe?

A fight erupted around noon on Saturday in the Ayvansaray neighborhood of Istanbul’s Fatih district.

According to Ihlas News Agency (IHA), the dispute began between two women who who run a coffeehouse once used as a filming location for Cukur and 34-year-old street vendor Ercan Cali.

The argument reportedly stemmed from the women asking Cali to move his stall to a different location.

The disagreement escalated into violence, and one of the women shot Cali with a firearm. Emergency services and police were dispatched to the scene following reports of the incident.

Cali was rushed to the hospital after receiving first aid from medical teams, but he later succumbed to his injuries. The two women involved in the incident were taken into police custody.

Cali’s body was taken to the Forensic Medicine Institute morgue for an autopsy.

Cukur is a Turkish crime thriller that premiered on October 23, 2017, and concluded on June 7, 2021, after airing 131 episodes across four seasons.