Driver in Fatal Saint-Avold Toll Booth Crash Arrested After Fleeing to Morocco

A Citroën Berlingo stolen from an association is involved in a fatal traffic accident on August 13 at the Saint-Avold toll booth in Moselle. Two individuals from Forbach are the perpetrators of the vehicle theft. As they were fleeing - one in the stolen vehicle, the other in his own vehicle - the driver of the stolen car forced the toll booth barrier in Saint-Avold as well as a second toll booth barrier a little further on in Farébersviller, causing a fatal accident, reports Le Parisien. The Citroën Berlingo collides with a 59-year-old Sanef employee, who dies.

On August 21, a judicial investigation was opened. The co-author of the theft was arrested on August 29, indicted for "theft in a group," then placed under judicial supervision. The driver of the stolen vehicle "left France the same evening of the accident" and took a plane "from Brussels airport to a Maghreb country," the prosecutor had specified in early September. An arrest warrant had then been issued and an extradition request made to Morocco to obtain the surrender of the suspect.

Back from Morocco, the alleged perpetrator of the acts surrendered to the gendarmerie on Tuesday morning. He admitted "to having driven the vehicle at the origin of the fatal accident while specifying that he was not aware of hitting the employee during the forced passage of the toll booth," said the Prosecutor of the Republic of Sarreguemines, Olivier Glady, in a statement. After being presented to an investigating judge and indicted for theft in a group, involuntary manslaughter with an aggravated vehicle, manifestly deliberate violation of a safety obligation, endangering the life of others and driving despite the suspension of the driver’s license, he was placed in pre-trial detention.