Şener, a columnist for the daily Posta and author of two books detailing the 2007 assassination of journalist Hrant Dink, went on trial in late year on charges of aiding the Ergenekon conspiracy, an alleged nationalist military plot to overthrow the government.
Şener said he believes the charges were retaliation for his work on the Dink murder. Ongoing trials of defendants in the Dink murder are widely viewed as insufficient because they involve only the accused gunman and other low-level participants. Evidence presented by Şener and other journalists points to police and national intelligence officials being neglectful, if not complicit, in the murder.