A thick eye and lots of blood. It didn’t matter much or Ercan Güral (66) could not have retelled his abuse at our café in Best on 15 February. His life could be saved, but his right eye no longer. He is blind to that for the rest of his life.
“I don’t see anything with this eye anymore,” says Ercan. Two months later his eye still feels thick. “As if the dentist has numb the right side of my head.” It can take a while before the feeling returns, doctors said to him.
On the night of 14 to 15 February, Ercan tried to appease a fight twice in his hometown. At the first in our cafe it was a boy he knows about his old work at the bicycle shed and the business owner. By getting between them, he fell hard with the back of his head against a slot machine. Outside on Wilhelminaplein, a new fight arose between the same boy and a neighbor, the cafe owner and a group of boys.
“He was very lucky that he is still alive.”
In the hospital it turned out that he had three fractures in his eye socket. “There was such a gigantic blood clot behind his eye that he was very lucky that he is still alive. If the ambulance had been later, he would not have survived, according to the doctor,” says his daughter Selda.
The doctors have cut off an optic nerve in order to reduce the pressure, but his eye could no longer be saved. According to his daughter, his back was also fur and blue. “It feels very strange,” says Ercan, emphasizing that it doesn’t feel right. “I didn’t eat anything for three weeks.” He is sitting in his eye a lot, tries to push it open. “It feels like it’s stuck, but I don’t see anything anymore.”
The abuse also ensured that his cancer operation on March 27 was canceled. The doctors have previously removed two places. Due to the abuse, Ercan is not yet ready for further treatment.
“We notice that he has become quieter.”
He himself says that the abuse has not had any further influence, but his daughter notices something else. “He is very stripped of it of course, but keeps up. We notice that he has become quieter and can no longer stand too many people around him.” Ercan still had many plans now that he is retired: “But now I am inside and I am no longer able to. I am afraid of encountering something.”
By sharing his story with Omroep Brabant, he hopes that the perpetrators who still walk around are picked up and get punished. Ercan does have a suspicion of who has abused him.
The police say that the investigation is still ongoing, several people have been interrogated and camera images have been viewed, but that has not yet led to an arrest. “Of course we call on people with information to share that with us, even if it is anonymous.”