Habil Kılıç was born in Borçka, Turkey, in 1963. When he was 22, he married his wife, whom he had met in Turkey but who was already living in Munich. He then moved there some time later. They had a daughter together. In 2000, the couple decided to open a fresh produce shop in Munich-Ramersdorf. However, Habil Kılıç also kept his job as a forklift driver and worked in the shop after his shifts.
In August 2001, almost a year and a half after opening the produce shop, Habil Kılıç was additionally working in the shop during the day because his wife and daughter were on holiday in Turkey. On the morning of 29 August 2001, he was shot dead in his shop by the NSU. Habil Kılıç was 38 years old. He was the fourth victim in the series of racist murders, the background to which only became clear in 2011. Before that, the authorities had mainly investigated the victims, their families, and those close to them. This was also the case after the murder of Habil Kılıç. After the police cleared the shop, the family were left to remove the traces of the murder themselves. The family had previously lived above the shop, but his wife gave up her flat and the shop and left the neighbourhood with her daughter. The NSU’s murder, the behaviour of the authorities, and the rumours they spread about the murdered man ultimately meant that the Kılıç family lost not only their father and husband, but also their neighbourhood and their livelihood.
Habil Kılıç’s wife, P. Kılıç, was the first relative to be questioned as a witness during the NSU trial. Judge Götzl treated her paternalistically. During her questioning on the 22nd day of the trial, P. Kılıç did not want to speak in the presence of ‘this woman’ – the main defendant in the NSU trial, Beate Zschäpe – about the situation following the killing of her husband: ‘How can this be? Can’t you imagine losing your husband and then your shop? How people talk about it when you’re treated like a suspect? What am I supposed to say in front of this woman?’ Götzl then told her that he expected a polite answer when he posed a polite question. At the judge’s insistence, P. Kılıç reported that the NSU had caused a great deal of damage, first murdering her husband, then destroying their whole circle of friends, and then their financial situation: ‘They destroyed everything, everything.’
Habil Kılıç is commemorated today by a memorial plaque at the family’s former shop in Bad-Schachener-Straße.
