Turkey: I Am But a Simple Murderer

Southeastern Turkey is the badlands of Asia Minor—a forbidding, sparsely populated region of parched plains and spiny, 10,000-ft. mountains, of swirling dust and barely passable roads. It is an inhospitable land to everybody except bandits and smugglers. For more than a decade, the most notorious bandit in the area has been Mehmet Ihsan Kilit, known throughout Turkey simply as "Kocero." He usually looked like a walking arsenal, with bandoleers of cartridges over his chest, binoculars dangling from his neck, a rifle slung over his shoulder, and a hunting knife or a revolver seemingly glued to his hand. He was...

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