Article 103/1 of the Turkish Penal Code: “Anyone who sexually abuses a child is punished with imprisonment from eight years to fifteen years. If sexual abuse remains at the level of harassment, it is sentenced to imprisonment from three to eight years. If the victim has not completed the age of twelve, the penalty cannot be less than ten years in case of abuse and five years in case of molestation. In the event that the perpetrator of the crime, which has remained at the level of molestation, is a child, investigation and prosecution depends on the complaint of the victim, parent or guardian. From the term sexual abuse;
a) All kinds of sexual behavior against children who have not completed the age of fifteen or who have not yet developed the ability to perceive the legal meaning and consequences of the act,
b) Sexual behavior towards other children based only on coercion, threat, deception or any other reason affecting the will is understood.”
The legislator defined touching the human body with “sexual behaviors” as sexual assault if the victim is an adult, and sexual abuse if the victim is a child. According to the provisions of paragraph 1 of these articles, the acts constituting the material element of the crimes of sexual assault and sexual abuse are the acts that violate the immunity of the body, involving any kind of bodily contact that has the characteristics of sexual behavior, continuously or momentarily, without inserting an organ or other object into the body. According to their intensity (for example, whether it is continuous or instantaneous), simple sexual assault will constitute the crime of sexual abuse or molestation of the child.
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