A fugitive since 2018 was finally captured after escaping authorities for eight years, during which he lived as a trans woman. Tuğrul Başar was detained by officers who carried out an operation in the busy neighborhood of Kadıköy, in Istanbul, Turkey, after a discreet and exhaustive investigation.
He had been convicted of three theft crimes committed while posing as a public official in 2010, but managed to escape authorities to avoid serving a three-year prison sentence. According to local press, investigators discovered that Tuğrul adopted a completely female identity to avoid detection and lived as a transgender woman throughout the entire period he was on the run, maintaining a feminine appearance.
Tuğrul also moved around Istanbul using the official Turkish identity card of his biological sister and presented the document whenever asked, without raising suspicion. The transformation was so radical that authorities could no longer compare him with the old photos from his criminal record.
