Two German tourists killed, five injured

Drove 200 metres at 100 kilometres per hour, missing two red lights. What happened to the woman who, in her Mercedes, ran over five young people in Lido di Camaiore on Wednesday evening 18 September and killed two young German tourists holidaying in Versilia? The Public Prosecutor's Office in Lucca has opened an investigation into double counts of negligent homicide causing personal injury. The driver, a former bartender living in Viareggio (Lu), has been placed under house arrest. Who is the arrested woman? 44-year-old Brazilian Katia Pereira Da Silva was driving her Mercedes on Wednesday evening 18 September. The impact at over 80 kilometres per hour left the two German tourists (who would have turned 18 and 19 in a few days) living in Duisburg no chance. They died instantly when they were hit by the car that had failed to run a red light. The car sped on, injuring five more people, before crashing into two other vehicles. The South American woman was taken to Versilia Hospital in shock, where her toxicology test came back negative. After being guarded by police officers in the hospital, the 44-year-old was taken to her apartment in Viareggio by police officers under house arrest in the morning. “I don't remember what happened,” the woman is said to have said in the first panicked moments after the tragic accident. “You're mistaken, it wasn't me, it's not my fault,” she is said to have muttered to the rescuers. What caused this 200-meter madness? The injured The most seriously injured person is still the one who was flown by air ambulance to Cisanello Hospital in Pisa for polytrauma. Two injured people are in Apuane Hospital in Massa and two others in Versilia Hospital; all are considered serious but not life-threatening. Traffic police investigators are currently reconstructing the exact sequence of events that led to the Mercedes running through two red lights. “It is an incident that has shocked the entire community, something like this has never happened before, a car at insane speed on the Via Italica has run over and killed two people and injured five others, damaging about ten parked cars and knocking over everything in its path, even after the second impact,” said the mayor of Camaiore, Marcello Pierucci, to the 50Canale television station, who rushed to the Via Italica immediately after the tragic accident. The victims The two victims, German students on a school trip, would have turned 18 and 19 in a few days: they came from Duisburg, Germany. The students attended the Duisburg-Mitte comprehensive school. A third student, who was also hit by the car, is in serious condition in the Versilia hospital.