Kept Driving Despite Child Under Car: SUV Hits Two Children at Kharkiv Crosswalk

He is suspected of driving under the influence of drugs.

In Kharkiv, the driver of a Toyota SUV hit two children who were crossing the road at a pedestrian crossing on a green light. This was reported by Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyi and the National Police. 

Information that a Toyota hit two minors at a pedestrian crossing at the intersection of Nauky Avenue and Tobolska Street was received by police on November 11 at 15:14.

Preliminary data indicates that two 13-year-old children, a boy and a girl, were injured in the accident. An investigative and operational team was urgently dispatched to the scene.

The information has been registered in the Unified Register of Statements and Notifications of Kharkiv District Police Department No. 3.

Monastyrskyi said that the driver is suspected of driving under the influence of drugs at the time of the accident.

He had previously been subject to criminal prosecution, but at the ministry level, an attempt to “hush up” the drug case, which never reached court, has now been discovered.

Denys Monastyrskyi
Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine

The person who hit two children at a pedestrian crossing in Kharkiv today has been detained by police and is currently undergoing a drug test. Police suspect the offender was under the influence of psychotropic or narcotic substances. He had previously been prosecuted under Article 309 of the Criminal Code, which covers the illegal production or storage of narcotic drugs, but for some reason the case was closed a year ago and never reached court.

Monastyrskyi also personally promised that the driver would bear full responsibility: “We will get to the bottom of this together with the prosecutor’s office, down to the last detail, of how this happened! The scoundrel will definitely answer for it! I guarantee it!”. 

In footage published by eyewitnesses, the children can be seen alive. They lay on the asphalt until an ambulance arrived.

At the same time, the driver of a Toyota Land Cruiser with registration plates AX 0412 HX continued driving for some time even though the girl he had hit was under the hood, right by the left wheel.