Judge rules mom needs to get sent back to Turkey with her son charged with killing somebody with his dad's Porsche

A federal magistrate judge today ordered Eylem Tok sent back to Turkey to face charges related to the way she allegedly tried to keep her son from facing the equivalent of vehicular-manslaughter charges.

Mom and son - who allegedly took a curve on a narrow Istanbul road at more than 100 m.p.h. and hit several people, killing one - had been in the US since 2024.

Both fled Turkey not long after the crash in the dead of the night. They were arrested at the British International School of Boston just as they were about to take a tour of the place so the kid could finish his secondary education.

At issue with Tok, who may or may not be an actual Turkish author, as with her son, is whether the charges she faces in Turkey are also things she could be charged with in the US, as required by the extradition treaty between the US and Turkey.

In his ruling today, US District Court Magistrate Judge Donald Cabell said the charges line up.

The Turkish government wants her back to face "one charge of Destroying, Concealing or Altering Evidence, in violation of Article 281 of the Criminal Code of Türkiye, and one charge of Protecting an Offender, in violation of and punishable by Article 283 of the Criminal Code of Türkiye," Cabell wrote. Both those charges have analogs in American law, he wrote: "The evidence before this Court is sufficient to justify Tok's committal for trial, on felony charges, had the offenses with which she is accused of having committed occurred in the United States."

Cabell ordered her turned over to the custody of the US Marshals Service pending her being put on a plane bound for Istanbul.

Cabell had approved extradition for her son earlier this month.