Ramy police chase correct says court-appointed expert

(ANSA) - ROME, MAR 12 - The Carabinieri police officer who was driving the car involved in the fatal Milan chase of a 19-year-old Egyptian-Italian man who jumped a control point on the back of a scooter driven by a 22 year-old Tunisian friend behaved in a correct manner, according to a forensic analysis provided by an expert appointed by the State Attorney's office in Italy's financial capital.
    The document was filed on Wednesday. The Carabinieri officer, charged of vehicular homicide together with the scooter's driver Fares Bouzidi, hit the breaks when he was supposed to and did not ram into the scooter at the end of the chase but hit it while the chase was still ongoing, according to the analysis provided by the expert.
    The expert's paper attributed responsibility to the scooter's driver for the accident that led to Ramy Elgaml's death. A video of the accident that took place on November 24 last year probed by investigators appeared to show the lead patrol car drive into the scooter at the end of the eight-kilometre chase across downtown Milan, which reportedly started when Elgaml decided to jump the checkpoint because he didn't have a valid license.
    The video also appeared to show officers approaching a witness and possibly intimating to him that he should erase evidence of the fatal crash, as he had maintained.
    The incident sparked several days of unrest in the high-crime former working class Corvetto district where the young man lived, in which several police were hurt, and nationwide protests. However, the expert witness wrote in his analysis that "it is possible to state that the responsibility for the fatal accident must be attributed to the driver of the Yamaha scooter, Bouzidi Fares, over his reckless and dangerous conduct".
    According to the paper filed by the consultant appointed by Milan prosecutors investigating Elgaml's death, Fares repeatedly violated traffic laws.
    After refusing to stop at a Carabinieri control point, Fares "started a freak and very tense chase at an extremely high speed", driving "in a reckless and extremely dangerous way", "dismissing danger" and "taking the risk of the consequences", according to the expert. (ANSA).