Mistaken identity posb. in Amsterdam balcony shooting: police

The street-level assassination of 60-year old Beyhan Demirci, who was shot while standing on her balcony, is possibly a case of mistaken identity, police revealed on Tuesday. The victim was shot by unidentified assailants standing on the street below in Amsterdam Nieuw-West on January 14th.

Demirci was shot with an automatic weapon while she was smoking a cigarette under a blanket on her balcony. She died at the scene of her Pieter van der Werfstraat flat, police said.

The perpetrators may have mistaken Demirci for her son, who often smoked on the same balcony and is known to have criminal relations.

It is at least the third case of an underworld assassination attempt causing the death of a bystander in less than a year. Ghana-born dishwasher Augustine Nyantakyi was gunned down in Amsterdam Zuidoost last month, and family man Stefan Regalo Eggermont was shot on the street in Amsterdam Centrum.

Luana Luz Xavier, the Brazilian-born girlfriend of known underworld figure Najib "Ziggy" H., was slain in front of her children while in Amstelveen. She was rumored to have lured another known figure to an attempt on his life.

Psychiatric institute director Rob Zeekhorst was also shot dead in Steenbergen, Noord-Brabant on New Year's Day, 2014. Police believe he may have been mistaken for a fruit merchant using his business for a drug smuggling operation. The merchant, Rinus Moerer, was killed weeks later.