At least eight people were injured Monday in New York after a man driving a van hit them in various places in the megalopolis, police said, who ruled out any “terrorist” motive at this stage.
The local press quickly mobilized when the New York police (NYPD) reported having been confronted at the end of Monday morning with the refusal to comply by a driver of a rental van who had struck and knocked down several pedestrians in Brooklyn, one of the five districts of the megalopolis.
Police response
Police officers tried to stop the vehicle, which continued its course, overturning other people in several places in the neighborhood before being chased and its driver was finally arrested.
A total of seven people and a police officer were injured, two of whom are in critical condition. Of the eight injured, three were riding small mopeds, police said.
“There is no indication of any involvement of terrorism” in this case, assured during a brief press briefing on the spot, in Brooklyn, the head of NYPD, Keechant Sewell.
The light has yet to be shed
But “we know for the moment very little about this case”, added the boss of the police of the city of New York, deeply marked by terrorism and ultra sensitized to alerts in terms of attacks.
Moreover, the incident of Monday noon occurred at the opening of a trial in Manhattan of an Uzbek who risks the death penalty for having, on October 31, 2017, killed eight people whom he had voluntarily knocked down and crushed at the wheel of his pick-up, an attack perpetrated in the name of the Islamic State group.