A manhole cover thrown from a motorway bridge near Hildesheim hits a car – two people are injured. The police quickly apprehend a suspect. According to a media report, the man is no stranger to officials.
It should be every driver’s nightmare: Two manhole covers were thrown onto the autobahn from a bridge over the A7 near Hildesheim – two people were injured. The police arrested a 50-year-old suspect. At the request of the public prosecutor’s office, a magistrate issued a pre-trial arrest warrant against the suspect, according to the public prosecutor’s office and the police. The man is now in custody.
One of the manhole covers had hit a moving car early on Saturday morning and smashed through the windshield. The 52-year-old driver was seriously injured, his 43-year-old passenger even life-threatening. Rescue workers treated the two injured people from Baden-Württemberg and took them to a hospital. According to the police, the 43-year-old was out of danger on Saturday afternoon.
The second manhole cover and stones landed in the northbound oncoming lane, damaging at least four vehicles. A suspect is a 50-year-old from the district of Hildesheim. The police and public prosecutor announced that he had been targeted during the search for the crime. Further details about the man were not initially known. However, the “Hildesheimer Allgemeine Zeitung” reported that the man had been busy with the authorities for years.
According to the report, he was already in court in 2016 for a whole series of crimes in Hildesheim – according to which he stole newspaper packages and bicycles again and again for months, and he is also said to be responsible for damage to property at an elementary school. There he is said to have stolen or hidden manhole covers several times. According to the report, the 50-year-old with a criminal record said at the time that inner voices had ordered him to commit the crimes. He was sentenced to one year in prison without parole. The public prosecutor’s office in Hildesheim was not yet available for comment.
According to a police spokeswoman, the manhole covers were thrown off a bridge on Saturday night that runs over the autobahn between the towns of Hasede and Asel north of Hildesheim. The police used several patrol cars, and a helicopter was also used. The two manhole covers, which weigh several kilograms, and the stones were secured and are to be examined for traces. According to initial findings, the manhole covers came from an industrial area in Harsum in the Hildesheim district.
At the scene of the crime on the Autobahn, forensic experts secured clues. An expert was also called in. There have recently been no similar cases in the Hildesheim area, said the police spokeswoman. However, in recent years there have been cases in Lower Saxony in which stones and manhole covers have been thrown onto roadways: In 2016, two manhole covers were thrown from a bridge onto the A27 near Walsrode in the Heidekreis. Motorists escaped with a fright.
In 2008, a six-kilogram wooden block thrown from a motorway bridge near Oldenburg smashed through the window of a car, killing a 33-year-old woman. A court sentenced the then 31-year-old perpetrator to life imprisonment.
(This article was first published on Sunday, August 21, 2022.)
