One person was killed and at least eight others injured Monday in New York after a man driving a pickup truck rammed them in various parts of Brooklyn, according to the press and the police, who speak of a “carnage” but without a “terrorist” motive.
New York police (NYPD) reported late Monday morning that they were confronted with the refusal to comply by a rental van driver who struck and knocked down several pedestrians and cyclists in at least two Brooklyn neighborhoods, one of the five arrondissements of the megalopolis.
Police officers tried to stop the vehicle which continued its course, overturning other people in several places, including while driving on sidewalks, before being chased and the driver was finally arrested.
In total, nine people – all men – were struck, eight of whom were injured, including a policeman, detailed in the evening the “New York Times”.
According to this newspaper and the Internet media “New York Daily News”, a forty-year-old died of his injuries.
Of the eight injured, three were traveling on bicycles or electric mopeds popular with delivery people, according to the police.
During an impromptu press briefing at the scene in Brooklyn in the morning, NYPD chief Keechant Sewell spoke of “carnage” while assuring that there was “no indication of terrorism involvement” in that case.
The police did not give the identity of the arrested suspect although the local press speaks of a 60-year-old Asian known to the police, justice and health services of the State of Nevada.
But “we know for the moment very little about this affair”, 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 Monday morning incidents came at the same time as the opening of a trial in Manhattan of an Uzbek who faces the death penalty for having, on October 31, 2017, killed eight people he had voluntarily knocked over and crushed at the wheel of his pickup, an attack perpetrated in the name of the jihadist group Islamic State.