Hung jury declared in sexual assault case against former Regent Square restaurateur

For the second time, a jury deliberating the case of a former Regent Square restaurant owner accused of sexual assault could not reach a verdict.

After four days of deliberation, the panel of five women and seven men was dismissed by a judge after advising the court it was unable to reach a unanimous decision on any of the four charges against Adnan Pehlivan.

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Anthony M. Mariani granted the defense motion for a mistrial.

The district attorney’s office must decide within 120 days whether it will try the case a third time. The first trial, in March 2019, also ended in a mistrial. In that case, jurors acquitted Pehlivan of simple assault and stalking but failed to reach a unanimous verdict on the other counts.

Pehlivan’s defense attorney, Lee Rothman, reacts to the hung jury. Prosecution has 120 days to decide if they will try Pehlivan a third time. pic.twitter.com/XZ29DWNNHk

— Paula Reed Ward (@PaulaReedWard) October 22, 2021

Pehlivan, the former owner of Istanbul Sofra, also was charged with involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, burglary, sexual assault and indecent assault stemming from an alleged attack on May 15, 2018.

Assistant District Attorney Emma Schoedel told the jury in her closing arguments Monday that Pehlivan, 50, followed the alleged victim and her two friends into Kopy’s bar on the South Side that night, bought them drinks to ingratiate himself with them, and then followed them to their Josephine Street home.

There, Schoedel said, Pehlivan entered their house through a window and sexually assaulted a 24-year-old woman.

Defense attorney Lee Rothman painted it as a consensual encounter during which the alleged victim “freaked out.”

Pehlivan testified that the woman invited him back to her home, but didn’t want her friends to know. He told the jury she instructed him to follow her home.

Throughout their deliberations, the jurors requested a number of items in evidence, including surveillance video from inside Kopy’s, body camera video from a Pittsburgh police officer who responded to the 911 call about the assault, as well as the video of Pehlivan’s car following the women through the South Side.

On Thursday, the panel informed the court that they were deadlocked. Mariani instructed them to keep working.

None of the jurors wished to comment after they were dismissed.

“Together, we were able to, again, create doubt in the jury’s mind,” Rothman said after the jurors were dismissed. “Twice now, 12 members of the community have viewed the evidence very closely. … They were very conscientious. Different minds differ on different subject matter, and we’re grateful my client is still innocent in the eyes of the law.

“We’re hopeful this will be the end.”