Shot in the head while eating dinner with her family, she was the nine-year-old victim of one of London’s most vicious gang wars.
The girl had been sitting inside a Turkish restaurant in Dalston, east London, when a gunman on a motorbike opened fire on three rivals sitting nearby. One of the six bullets lodged in her brain, leaving her with potentially lifelong health complications.
Javon Riley, 33, who helped organise the drive-by shooting, has now been convicted at the Old Bailey of four counts of attempted murder in what prosecutors described as ‘a planned assassination of members of a rival gang, Mr Riley and others’.
Those ‘others’ are the Tottenham Turks, sworn enemies of their Turkish adversaries, the Hackney Bombers. The three men, Mustafa Kiziltan, Kenan Aydogdu and Nasser Ali – who all survived – were allegedly affiliated with the Bombers, or ‘Bombacilars’. The gunman is still at large with a £15,000 bounty on his head.
While undoubtedly the most shocking outbreaks of London gangland violence in recent memory, the horrific events of May 2024 were just one episode in a long vendetta between the two gangs that has claimed at least eight lives in the capital.
And with the conclusion of Riley’s trial, the Daily Mail can now reveal a possible ninth victim, Erdal Ozmen, a father of two shot dead in Stoke Newington on August 5 – who a close friend quickly identified as a bomber’s member.
The 45-year-old was described as one of the mob’s ‘top boys’, and was previously convicted of attempted murder for his role in the 2003 shooting of a Turkish man outside a petrol station in Tottenham.
Many members of the local Turkish community were ready to blame the Tottenham Turks for Mr. Ozmen’s death when the Mail asked who was responsible. How many more victims could this violent conflict claim, and what started it?
The long vendetta between the Hackney Bombers and Tottenham Turks has its roots in a fight for control over the UK’s lucrative heroin trade, which is dominated by Turkish criminals.
While there have been more than 35 major flare-ups between the two gangs – including 20 shootings and three murders – those involved have mostly escaped the glare of publicity due to the perception that their crimes are ‘bad on bad’ (criminals attacking other criminals).
However, this is now changing, when their fight destroyed the life of a helpless girl.
The Hackney Bombers have their roots in a drug empire established by Huseyin Baybasin, 67, who was dubbed the ‘Pablo Escobar of Europe’ after taking control of much of the heroin being exported from the poppy fields of Afghanistan in the 1970s.
He is presently serving a life sentence in the Netherlands after convictions for drug trafficking and conspiracy to murder in 2001.
Following his conviction, the family business was taken over by his younger brother, Abdullah Baybasin, 64, who is confined to a wheelchair after being shot in the spine by a rival.
According to reports, he worked as an informant for UK Customs and M15, providing information about senior Turkish politicians involved in the drug trade.
In return for this, he was permitted to move to Britain in the mid-1990s along with other high-ranking associates and was finally given political asylum.
But embarrassingly for the British officials, their prized informer established himself within the north London Turkish community and waged a reign of terror, recruiting young thugs known as ‘The Bombacilar’ [bombers] to extort businesses and gain control of the drugs trade.
At one point, Abdullah and his brothers, who originate from south-east Turkey, were said to be controlling 90 per cent of the UK’s heroin market.
He conducted his operation from a shop in Hackney but lived in a grand detached home he together purchased with them in the wealthy Canons Drive Estate of Edgware, north London, which they still own.
Over the years, they have frequently clashed with the Tottenham Turks as part of a gang war that has extended across Europe – reportedly leading to more than 20 murders.
One of the Tottenham Turks’ former leaders was Hayri Goztas, who, behind the facade of a hardworking cafe owner in Green Lanes, north London, served as the ‘godfather’ of one of Britain’s biggest drug smuggling operations. He was known as ‘Aga’, or Turkish for leader.
In 2012, he was sentenced to 16 years’ imprisonment for importing up to £1 million worth of heroin per week following a National Crime Squad undercover operation.
Turkish community sources say he has been released and is still in the UK, even though a judge ordered his deportation following his sentence.
Another leader, Kemal Eren, who is nicknamed Parmaksiz, which means ‘No Fingers’ in Turkish, escaped the UK in 2012 after the slaying of another Bombacilar mobster.
Izzet Eren, another prominent leader of the Tottenham Turks, was apprehended in Moldova two years ago after he escaped from a Turkish prison.
Eren was jailed for 21 years in 2015 for firearms crimes in London – but had been moved to a prison in Turkey in 2019.
Senior members of both mobs were targeted in the cycle of violence.
Tottenham Turks members shot and killed Ali Armagan in 2012, a high-ranking Bombacilar member, as he sat in his custom-built Audi A8 limousine outside Turnpike Lane underground station.
Just weeks earlier, Zafer Eren, 34, who had connections with the Tottenham Turks gang, was shot dead in Southgate, north London.
Oktay Erbasli, 23, a prominent member of the Tottenham Turks, was shot dead as he waited at traffic lights in his Range Rover when a hitman on a motorbike connected to the Bombacilar gang pulled up alongside him and opened fire.
On one occasion, armed thugs clashed with each other in broad daylight along Green Lanes in Haringey, resulting in the death of one gang member and dozens injured.
The brutal slaying of a Turkish radio DJ in 2023 is also thought to be connected to the vendetta.
Mehmet Koray Alpergin and his girlfriend, Gozde Dalbudak, were kidnapped in central London last October.
Mr Alpergin, 43, was beaten, throttled, burned and stabbed before his body was dumped in an Essex woodland.
Two men were found guilty of his killing last December, with the court told that ‘international organised crime’ was at the heart of the case.
Despite the ‘Mr Bigs’ of both gangs being pursued by police, their vast criminal operations remain intact with little sign that British justice has made any inroads into their activities.
Abdullah was incarcerated for 22 years in 2006 after admitting to blackmail and perverting the course of justice, and a further 10 years, to run consecutively, after being found guilty of drug smuggling.
His trial at the time heard that he was head of a £10 billion operation criminal organisation involved in extortion rackets, human trafficking, prostitution, loan sharking, money laundering and drug trafficking.
However, he was exonerated after a retrial at Woolwich Crown Court, where a judge determined that a conviction would be risky due to the absence of prosecution evidence.
He has recently been photographed in Spain. Another brother, Mehmet, 59, is presently serving a 30-year prison sentence after being sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court in 2011 for attempting to import a 40-tonne shipment of cocaine into the UK with a Merseyside gang.
Following Riley’s conviction, Metropolitan Police Detective Inspector Ben Dalloway said: ‘Javon Riley’s actions traumatically altered the trajectory of a little girl’s life. While this outcome serves as a sliver of justice, the dangerous individual responsible for pulling the trigger remains on our streets.
‘Those who ordered this shooting are a highly sophisticated criminal organisation. We understand that people may be worried about talking to us because of this, but it is imperative we hear from anyone who can assist this investigation.
‘Justice must be secured for this little girl and her family.’
The girl’s mother said in a statement: ‘In a single moment, the future we had imagined for our daughter was torn away. She was once an energetic, adventurous child—everything that celebrated movement, energy, and life.
‘Now, weakness on her left side means she can only watch from the sidelines, living with a titanium plate in her skull and a bullet still in her brain. As parents, we are shattered—emotionally, physically, mentally, and financially.
‘Each day brings new challenges, from her slower growth on one side to the emotional and mental scars that cannot be seen. The world we once believed was safe for our child now feels frightening and uncertain.
‘This was not just an accident – even if our daughter was not the intended target, those responsible were still attempting to take lives, it is brutal and inhumane. We live with this pain every day, knowing nothing will ever be the same for our family.’
Our politicians don’t appear to like the UK or its people, and the country has a weak judiciary and a police force that welcomes foreign criminals.
These days, crime and drug use are rife in London and other cities, and we have become a soft touch in the UK with our human rights lawyers defending them – they all need to be deported, but that’s what happens when our government authorises mass immigration.
And why do both immigrant criminals and gang members escape deportation after their first offence? Human rights should be denied to them if they commit crimes like murder; if they act like monsters, they should be treated as such.
With their Turkish supermarkets, barbers, restaurants, and coffee shops, we now know where the majority of these migrants make their living. It’s known as legalising and cleansing the money.
How does our Prime Minister sleep at night? And how can he be proud of what this country has become? And what is he afraid of?
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 