Illegal race leaves mother, daughter in serious condition
At least three suspects fled the scene. Police now investigating crash as attempted murder.
Berlin-Late Monday at least one car involved in a suspected high-speed race on Kurfürstendamm collided with a Ford Fiesta not involved in the race at about 9.30pm, injuring four.
Two of the four victims, a mother and daughter in the Ford, were injured seriously, according to information obtained by the Berliner Zeitung. The main suspect vehicle, a BMW, was travelling west near Schaubühne when it collided with the Ford.
The Ford tumbled onto its roof and witnesses at a nearby restaurant hurried to the scene and flipped the car upright. The woman in the car and her daughter were both unconscious.
The BMW driver as well as at least two other drivers involved in the race left in two unscathed vehicles. The BMW was abandoned at the scene.
Police are investigating the collision as attempted murder. A court recently upheld a murder conviction for one of two men that caused a 1 Februar 2016 collision that led to the death of an uninvolved motorist.
The duo ignored traffic signals during an illegal race and t-boned the victim's Jeep as he turned out of Nürnberger Straße onto Tauentzienstraße – the victim had a green light and was killed instantly.
Hamdi H. is serving a life sentence for the accident – prosecutors successfully argued that the duo, which reached estimated speeds of up to 170kmh, were so reckless that they had to know their behaviour could lead to death. The other convicted driver, Marvin N., has successfully appealed his sentence and is waiting for a lower court to review his case.
The 2016 sentences and Tuesday's crash show that police have had little success stopping the races on one of the city's most famous streets – last year a Berlin politician discovered that the number of known races in Berlin jumped 22 per cent in 2019 over 2018.
In Tuesday's accident, the fire department said the remaining two injured were treated at the site of the accident.
"We were on-scene with 36 men. The scene of the accident was handed over to the police," the fire department announced on Twitter.