Prosecutors have demanded a prison sentence for a Turkish teacher who sent "sexually offensive" messages to a 15-year-old student via Facebook.
The mother of the student discovered the inappropriate messages sent by the philosophy teacher, who worked in a religious school in the province of Tekerdag, western Turkey, according to the site "Hurriyet".
The mother lodged a complaint with both the local police and the Regional Education Directorate. Some of the messages included phrases such as "Habibi and my son Gemayel and kisses".
School officials conducted an administrative investigation against the teacher, married with two children, prompting him to write to the student's mother to clarify "misunderstandings".
In the letter, the teacher said that he loves all his students and addresses his children in this way. He apologized to the mother for what they had gone through, and asked the mother to withdraw the complaint against him.
He wrote in the letter: "If the devil has pushed me and I have done something wrong, let God help me."
The teacher also said he took the pupil to the beach and spent the night together in a tent, as he had done with successful students.
However, the prosecutor requested up to 3 years' imprisonment for the teacher, on the grounds that the letters contained some form of sexual harassment.
