Bozma is the decision by which a higher Turkish court finds the decision under review unlawful and removes it, usually sending the file back for a new decision. A lawyer abroad meets the word in the operative line of a Court of Cassation judgment or in a later petition that cites the earlier round. Two questions settle the English: which court reversed, and whether the reversal removed the legal effects of the decision at all.
Where the word appears
In civil cases the Court of Cassation (Yargıtay) reverses the decision under appeal in whole or in part, on the grounds the Code lists and with reasons (HMK Article 371(1)); the file then goes to a first-instance court or to a regional court, depending on which decision was reversed (Article 373(1) and (2)). In criminal cases the Court of Cassation reverses for unlawfulness that affects the judgment and states each ground separately (CMK Article 302(2)). The word also appears one tier lower: in a criminal istinaf, the regional court of appeal may itself reverse the first-instance judgment and send the file back (CMK Article 280(1)(e)).
Reversed or quashed, not annulled
The suggested rendering is “reversal” for the noun and “reversed” for the verb, with “quashed” as an alternative in a criminal judgment. Both say that the higher court found the lower decision wrong in law. “Annulled” is the word to avoid: an English reader may connect it with setting aside an administrative act or with the nullity of a marriage. “Cancelled” is an everyday verb that does not describe what a court does to a decision. A partial reversal becomes “reversed in part”, with the reversed item identified by its number, and grounds that a criminal judgment lists one by one stay a numbered list.
What a reversal leaves open
A reader trained in a common law system may take a reversal as the end of the matter on that point, with the lower court bound to follow it. The Turkish Codes add a step. A regional court that receives a reversed civil file hears the parties and then decides whether to follow the reversal (HMK Article 373(3)). In criminal cases the court that hears the case again asks those concerned what they have to say against the reversal (CMK Article 307(1)), and regional and first-instance courts alike have a right to persist (Article 307(4)). The English keeps the reversal and the sending back as two parts of the operative line and names the receiving court as the judgment does; whether that court followed the reversal is shown by a later decision, not by the word bozma.
Kaldırma, and reversal in the interest of the law
In civil istinaf the regional court does not reverse: for the procedural defects the Code lists, it sets the decision aside without examining the merits and sends the file back (HMK Article 353(1)(a)), and “set aside and remitted” renders that kaldırma. Kanun yararına bozma is the second trap. Where the Court of Cassation accepts a civil application in the interest of the law, the decision is reversed, but the reversal does not remove its legal consequences (Article 363(2)). A bare “reversed” would suggest that the parties’ position had changed; “reversed in the interest of the law, without effect on the parties” is suggested for a civil file. A criminal chamber also reverses in the interest of the law (CMK Article 309(3)), and the Code sets out separately what follows for each kind of decision (Article 309(4)); the translation renders the judgment’s own words and adds nothing to the phrase.