Death Rebellin, pirate truck driver tracked down in Germany: he saw him on the ground and ran away

Every detail that emerges is a further stab. And it makes the pain even more terrible. The driver of the German truck who in Montebello Vicentino, late on Wednesday morning, overwhelmed and killed Davide Rebellin and then lost track of himself, was identified thanks to the collaboration between the Carabinieri of Vicenza with the German Police, the Cooperation Service International Police (Scip) and Interpol, and reported on the loose: he is German (he lives in Recke), he is 62 years old and has a disturbing series of precedents. From the reconstructions, everything suggests that he had noticed what happened. To the point of stopping for a few minutes in the nearest parking lot, taking a look at the bodywork of the vehicle (looking below) and above all going back and observing the 51-year-old Venetian champion closely: there are allegedly several photographs of witnesses on the spot, among other things, who they prove it. “The violent investment caused immediate death”, confirmed the Public Prosecutor of Vicenza in an official communication. Despite everything, the driver went away: appalling, aberrant behavior.

Justice

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The Vicenza Public Prosecutor’s Office has opened a case for vehicular homicide aggravated by the failure to provide assistance and has ordered an autopsy on Davide’s body (for this reason the funeral, scheduled for Wednesday morning in Lonigo, has been postponed). But the driver, under investigation in Italy, is not in custody because the German penal code does not contemplate the crime of vehicular homicide. Consequently, the possibility of his extradition now does not arise: it is not possible. In Italy, however, the process will be instructed in any case: the 62-year-old will not have the obligation to appear in our country, he will be able to have a lawyer chosen by him or appointed ex officio. According to investigative sources, the lorry driver was charged with withdrawing his driving license for drunk driving in Chieti (in 2014) and an extinguished sentence (due to the expiry of time after having negotiated a deal with the single judge) before the Court of Foggia (2001) for having violated the obligation to stop after an accident in which other people had been involved. For vehicular homicide – in Italy it has been a crime since 2016, article 589-bis of the penal code introduced by the Law of 23 March number 41 – the basic sentence ranges from 2 to 7 years, net of aggravating circumstances (such as driving in state of intoxication, for example).

Investigations

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The provincial commander of Vicenza, Colonel Giuseppe Moscati, spoke of “a close investigative activity that allowed us to give a face and a name to the driver”. The reconstruction refers to how the man had entered Italy on Wednesday morning. The collaboration between the Revenue Agency and the Thorl-Maglern Police Cooperation Center of Italy, Austria and Slovenia made it possible to identify the vehicle: a Volvo articulated lorry with a German license plate (owned by a Recke forwarding company, headed to the driver’s brother) who had to load goods: the last one, at the Interporto of Verona, in an international shipping company. “In the early afternoon”, the prosecutor specified: the phrase makes it clear that he had gone there after the fatal accident in Rebellin. In addition to absurd behavior, a huge mistake: there the investigators obtained a copy of the identity card (presented to enter the Interporto) which, compared with the photos taken at the scene of the accident, allowed the man to be identified . In the area of ​​the accident, close to the roundabout of the Regional road 11 and near the restaurant-hotel “La Padana”, there were also surveillance cameras, but in reality the Carabinieri immediately knew the truck and the nationality of the driver , thanks to the help of eyewitnesses. And apparently, the owner of the Recke company collaborated with the authorities, explaining how his brother had returned to Germany first in the direction of Berlin, then subsequently to Recke, in North Rhine-Westphalia. Compared to the place of the accident are 1100 kilometers.

Facts

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The dynamics of the investment now seem quite clear, even if the Public Prosecutor’s Office has announced that “the necessary investigations are underway for the exact reconstruction”: Davide Rebellin, who retired from competitive cycling on Sunday 16 October after a thirty-year career among professionals, would have been “hooked” by the heavy vehicle at the exit from the roundabout. The driver would have hit him right in the maneuver to enter the parking lot. A detail confirmed by the fact that a bloodstain remained in the parking area of ​​the trucks. As already emerged on Wednesday, Carlo – one of Davide’s brothers, the others are Simone and Stefano – had gone to the scene after learning that an accident had involved a cyclist. His immediate words remain emblematic: “Davide had left in the morning… He had also asked me if we wanted to go for a bike ride together. I couldn’t do it for work. And then what happened happened. These he’s done it millions and millions of times, he had just finished his pro career but he continued to ride a bike just the same. It was his life. And he also had other plans”. His wife Françoise, his mother Bridget, his brothers: the atrocity of the pain of surviving those you love is not even explainable. Yet their suffering is dignified, very composed. And it is accompanied by the most legitimate of requests: that justice be done.