Mayor shocked SUV driver drives cyclist to death in Paris after argument
First a cyclist and the driver of an SUV clash in heavy Paris traffic. Then the car driver is said to have deliberately rammed into the 27-year-old and run him over. A murder investigation is underway.
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- An SUV driver is suspected of murder in Paris for allegedly deliberately running over a cyclist after an argument.
- Police arrested the 52-year-old driver after witnesses reported intentional behavior. The cyclist died despite rapid assistance.
- The mayor of Paris demands a severe punishment.
An SUV driver in Paris is suspected of deliberately running over and killing a cyclist after a traffic dispute. The 52-year-old driver of the heavy SUV was arrested on the spot after the incident in the center of the city on Tuesday evening, the public prosecutor's office announced.
As witnesses spoke of deliberate behavior on the part of the driver when he drove the car towards the 27-year-old cyclist, the criminal investigation department began an investigation into suspected murder.
The two men are said to have had an argument and when they wanted to drive on, the driver of the SUV rammed into the cyclist and ran him over in his path, reported the newspaper "Le Parisien". The cyclist suffered a cardiac arrest - the quickly arriving emergency services were unable to resuscitate him.
Mayor calls for severe punishment
The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, who has been campaigning for years for the expansion of cycle paths and cycle lanes in the capital, reacted with shock and outrage. "Yesterday afternoon, a 27-year-old cyclist died after being deliberately run over by a car driver on Boulevard Malesherbes in the 8th arrondissement." This act must be severely punished. According to the public prosecutor's office, the SUV driver's daughter, who was born in 2007, was also in the car.
The sharp increase in bicycle traffic in Paris regularly leads to chaotic and dangerous situations. The cyclists themselves are also responsible, as they disregard the rules and try to move faster with risky maneuvers. Just over a year ago, the city introduced a code of conduct for road traffic, a "Code de la rue", to encourage all road users to show more mutual respect.
Since the beginning of October, Paris has tripled the parking tariff for SUVs. The city argued that the heavy vehicles cause increased pollution, take up a lot of public space and endanger road safety.
SDA