Trial begins in sexual assault case against Regent Square restaurateur

The former Istanbul Sofra restaurant owner accused of sexual assault was back on trial Tuesday, more than two years after a jury deadlocked on some of the charges against him and acquitted him on others.

Trial began in the case against Adnan Pehlivan, 50, who still faces charges of burglary, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and sexual assault stemming from an incident on Pittsburgh’s South Side on May 15, 2018.

During opening statements before Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Anthony M. Mariani, both sides reiterated similar positions from the first trial held in March 2019.

The prosecution alleged that Pehlivan broke into the alleged victim’s home and attacked her after following her home from a bar where he bought her drinks.

The defense said that the sexual acts were consensual and that it was only after the alleged victim sobered up that she became upset at what was happening.

The case is expected to last at least two weeks.

On Tuesday, Assistant District Attorney Emma Schoedel repeated the words “stranger danger” to the jury, telling the panel that the alleged victim woke up during the sexual assault in the bed of her home on Josephine Street.

The Tribune-Review does not name victims of sexual assault.

Police said the woman, now 28, had been at Kopy’s bar with two friends when Pehlivan, who was wearing a suit, sat down next to them.

He bought them shots of Fireball whiskey and engaged in small talk, the woman testified Tuesday.

“I found it strange,” she said. “His presentation didn’t really fit with the environment. He was older than everyone else in the bar. He was out of place.”

As part of that testimony, the prosecution played several minutes of video taken from inside the bar, showing Pehlivan’s interaction with the women.

Police said after the women left the bar, Pehlivan followed them back to their house in his car, broke into the alleged victim’s bedroom and attacked her.

Schoedel told the jury in her opening that investigators found buttons from Pehlivan’s dress shirt and a torn piece of T-shirt in her house, and his DNA on the alleged victim.

“She fought him off,” Schoedel said. “She fought like hell.”

But defense attorney Anne Marie Mancuso told the jurors there was no physical evidence to show a break-in. Instead, she said that Pehlivan and the woman planned to meet up, but that she did not want her friends to know.

Mancuso said the encounter was consensual, telling the jury that her client is a successful businessman who did nothing to disguise himself or hide his identity. Pehlivan previously owned Istanbul Sofra, a restaurant in Regent Square.

Instead, the alleged victim, who had been intoxicated, began to regret her decision in the middle of the act and became upset, Mancuso said.

In the first trial, the jury deliberated for more than nine hours before declaring it was deadlocked on the sexual assault charges. The panel acquitted Pehlivan of stalking and simple assault.