Gang Leader Jailed for Life for Orchestrating Restaurant Shooting

Beytullah Gunduz, 40, a high-ranking member of the Hackney Turks organised crime group, has been sentenced to life in prison for orchestrating a shooting outside a Turkish restaurant. The attack, which occurred on June 20 of last year, targeted Onur Guzel, 38, who was extorting £100,000 from.

CCTV footage captured Guzel lying on the pavement after being struck by a single bullet to the torso while on a work break. Prosecutors stated that Gunduz was at the center of extorting Guzel and the local community. The motive was clearly financial, aimed at ensuring perceived rivals and business owners in what Gunduz considered his territory paid up.

Just weeks before the shooting of Guzel, Gunduz had been demanding the £100,000 from him, whose father owns the restaurant. The Old Bailey heard that Gunduz wrongly accused Guzel's family of paying the same amount to a rival gang, the Tottenham Turks.

This incident was part of a larger, ongoing conflict between the Hackney Turks and the Tottenham Turks. Gunduz himself had been the target of a shooting ordered by the Tottenham Turks in May 2024, an incident that resulted in a nine-year-old girl sustaining a bullet lodged in her brain. Gunduz was reportedly at the Evin restaurant minutes before this attack, during which six bullets were fired from a passing motorbike.

Following a trial last year, Javon Riley, identified as a hired spotter and getaway driver in the incident that injured the girl, was jailed for life with a minimum term of 34 years for grievous harm and attempted murder. The gunman in the attack on Guzel, Dogan Over, who fired the shot from a Kia Niro, fled to Istanbul on June 25 and has not returned. Gunduz was not in the car but was alleged to have been in the vicinity, assisting Over.

Gunduz denied conspiracy to murder in relation to the June 2024 shooting but was found guilty. He refused to attend his sentencing on Friday and was jailed in his absence. His barrister indicated he was too frightened to attend in person due to fears of an attack.

At the sentencing, Judge Mark Lucraft KC described Guzel's injuries as permanent and irreversible. Guzel is currently living with a stoma bag pending an operation. In a victim impact statement, Guzel described how the attack had altered the course of his life and taken his sense of safety, stating he is no longer the person he was before the incident.

Guzel had informed police from his hospital bed about previous shooting incidents weeks earlier, which were blamed on the Tottenham Turks. In April of the previous year, his brother's house was targeted, followed two days later by five shots fired at the restaurant when it was empty. In November 2024, Guzel's brother reportedly received a text message demanding £100,000, accompanied by an image of a gun, threatening family members' heads. The attackers had reportedly intended to target Guzel's brother's home but went to the wrong address, with bullets passing through a neighbor's door.

Following these incidents, Guzel's father, a co-owner of the restaurant, allegedly received a phone call demanding £300,000 due to police notification. His sister-in-law also reportedly received a text stating that involving the police would result in higher demands and another shooting, with the threat, "The next one will be your head."

Guzel testified that his family never paid any money to gangs. Gunduz, who denied involvement and knew Guzel as a regular at the restaurant, has prior convictions dating back to 2008 for offenses including possessing an offensive weapon, drugs, threatening behavior, assaulting a police constable, and property damage.

His legal counsel stated that Gunduz accepted his life choices have left his parents without his support and that he will live with the shame of this. Judge Lucraft KC noted the shooting as another instance in a long-running series of retaliatory attacks, murders, and attempted murders between the Hackney Turks and Tottenham Turks, and a sad example of innocent individuals caught in the violence.