A woman, who worked for a firm representing a defendant’s legal team in a kidnap trial, has been found guilty of perverting the court of justice after she unsuccessfully attempted to dissuade a key witness from attending court to give evidence.

Eylem Kahraman, 31 (30.09.86), of Bursland Road, EN3, was found guilty of perverting the course of justice at Blackfriars Crown Court on Friday, 22 December.

She will be sentenced at the same court on 19 January 2018.

On 15 August 2016, a kidnap trial commenced at Wood Green Crown Court. Kahraman was part of the legal team representing the defendant.

The trial commenced in the morning but encountered issues because the key prosecution witness failed to turn up.

Enquiries were made to locate the witness and a time limit was set for the prosecution to locate her and bring her to court.

The officer in the case managed to locate the witness; she said she was too scared to go to the trial, but she refused to elaborate on why.

The witness was then taken to Wood Green Crown Court by a police officer and accompanied by a family member.

While in the witness care room at the court, the witness received a WhatsApp message from Kahraman. The family member alerted the police officer who then viewed several messages on the witness’s phone from Kahraman.Subsequent enquiries revealed that the witness had been contacted numerous times since 9 August 2016, primarily by text message, by Kahraman who was trying to persuade the witness not to attend court and give evidence.

Kahraman was then arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice, which she denied. She was charged on 16 August 2016.

Detective Constable Karl Latham, the investigating officer from Haringey CID, said: “Kahraman went out of her way to repeatedly contact the key witness in a trial. In essence, a member of a defence team has tried to prevent a trial from going ahead and thought they were being clever in doing so. As it transpires, Kahraman was far from clever in her approach to perverting the course of justice; so blatant were her actions that she didn’t even delete the messages despite knowing what she had done was wrong.

“Offences like this cannot and will not be tolerated. Any tactics used in the course of criminal proceedings that are believed to amount to perverting the course of justice will be taken seriously and investigated thoroughly. The verdict today should re-iterate the fact that everyone involved in legal proceedings is required to act professionally and ethically throughout the course of the proceedings to ensure that the trial is a fair trial for all parties.

“We are very grateful to the witness’ family member who brought the messages to our attention.”