Former miss Turkey gets 14 months suspended sentenced for insulting Turkish President Erdogan

A former Miss Turkey Merve Buyuksarac, 27, was given a 14 months suspended prison sentence on Tuesday by a Turkish court for insulting President Tayyip Erdogan in a poem she posted on Instagram.

An Istanbul court found the model guilty of insulting a public official but suspended the sentence on condition she does not repeat the act for the next five years.
She denied insulting Mr Erdogan. Her lawyer says he will file a formal objection to the verdict and take the case to a higher court.
Rights groups have criticized Turkey for backtracking on freedom of speech. 

Insulting the president is a crime punishable by up to four years in jail in Turkey. The law was seldom used until Erdogan became president in August 2014, since which time more than 1,800 cases have been opened  for insulting him, including against cartoonists, journalists and teenagers.

Buyuksarac, who was crowned Miss Turkey in 2006, was briefly detained last year for sharing the poem on Instagram in 2014. It was called “the Master’s Poem” and referred to a high-level Turkish corruption scandal in 2014.