The attack
On June 28, 2016, a coordinated attack struck the international terminal area of Istanbul Atatürk Airport. Initial reporting changed quickly as hospitals and authorities revised casualty figures. The judicial record later used in the criminal case described 45 people killed and 163 injured.
Because early breaking-news reports used smaller numbers, this page relies on the later figure used by Turkish prosecutors and the Istanbul court rather than the first-night totals.
Investigation
Turkish authorities attributed the attack to Islamic State. No organization issued a contemporaneous public claim of responsibility in the immediate aftermath, so this page presents the attribution as the conclusion of Turkish investigators and prosecutors rather than as a self-proclaimed statement from the group.
The criminal investigation expanded beyond the people who died during the attack and focused on alleged facilitators, organizers and members of the wider network. Ultimately, 46 defendants were tried on terrorism-related charges.
The 2018 judgment
On November 16, 2018, Istanbul's 13th Heavy Penal Court convicted six defendants of offences that included deliberately killing 45 people and attempting to overthrow the constitutional order. Anadolu Agency reported that each received 46 aggravated life sentences. The same defendants also received additional prison terms for attempted killings and property offences.
The six were Rıza Coşkun, Levent Uysal, Ahmet Kaplan, Eyüp Demir, Ahmet Dizlek and Djamel Slimani. The court's ruling did not mean that every one of the 46 defendants was assigned the same role or sentence. Crime by Region therefore does not describe the entire defendant group as murderers.
What the judgment does — and does not — establish
The principal attackers died during the airport assault and were never criminal defendants. The later trial dealt with the alleged network surrounding the attack. This matters because media summaries sometimes collapse the perpetrators at the scene and later convicted facilitators into one category.
The case is classified here as solved / adjudicated because the attack, perpetrators and organized criminal responsibility were substantially established and the main trial produced convictions. That classification does not imply that every person initially investigated was convicted or that every allegation made during the investigation became a judicial finding.
Timeline
June 28, 2016: the attack strikes Atatürk Airport in Istanbul.
June 29, 2016: authorities continue revising casualty figures as the investigation expands.
2017–2018: dozens of defendants are prosecuted in the main terrorism case.
July 9, 2018: prosecutors request aggravated-life sentences for six principal defendants.
November 16, 2018: Istanbul 13th Heavy Penal Court sentences six defendants to 46 aggravated life terms each and imposes further prison terms.
Current status
The attack is solved and adjudicated for Crime by Region's editorial purposes. Forty-five deaths were recognized in the main court proceedings, and six principal defendants received aggravated-life sentences in 2018. This page does not assume later sentence changes or releases without specific judicial documentation.