Soccer player admits to killing ‘coronavirus’-stricken son
A Turkish soccer player has admitted to smothering his five-year-old son to death while the child was being treated in hospital for symptoms linked to COVID-19.
Cevher Toktas told police he killed his son Kasim at Dortcelik Children’s Hospital in Bursa because he never loved the boy “even when he was born”.
The child was admitted to the hospital with a cough and high fever on April 23, and placed in isolation with his father.
Later that day Toktas called for doctors, claiming his son’s condition had taken a turn for the worse. The child was rushed to the intensive care unit, where he died less than two hours later.
Kasim’s death was originally not ruled as suspicious, although he tested negative for COVID-19.
But Toktas turned himself in to the police on May 4 and confessed to having smothered his son, 10 days after the youngster’s funeral.
According to local media, the 32-year-old said he yelled for doctors after committing the crime “to help to draw any suspicions away from me”.
Toktas allegedly told investigators he killed Kasim because he “never loved him, even when he was born, and I can’t state why, I have no mental issues”.
The soccer player was taken into custody. No trial date has been set yet.
Turkish authorities have ordered Kasim’s body to be exhumed for a post-mortem.