Police open fire during chase in Northern Romania, shoot 7-year-old girl by mistake

A 7-year-old girl was shot in the leg on Thursday, June 20, during a Police chase in the Poienile de sub Munte commune in the county of Maramures, in Northern Romania. The incident occurred while the police officers were trying to catch a driver who didn’t stop at their request.

In the afternoon of June 20, police officers used both acoustic and light signals to stop a car traveling through the Poienile de sub Munte commune but the driver refused to stop. This caused the policemen to chase the vehicle and even open fire in an attempt to make him pull over, local Digi24 reported. During the pursuit, the car left the road and crossed the Luhei river, the Maramures County Police Inspectorate said in a press release.

The policemen later found the car abandoned nearby, parked outside a house in the commune. They decided to check the house and found that the driver had also abandoned three children there, aged between 5 and 16 years. One of them, a 7-year-old girl, had suffered a leg injury and the policemen called an ambulance. The Police didn’t give details on how the child was injured but judicial sources told Mediafax that the injury was caused by one of the bullets shot by the policemen during the chase, which allegedly ricocheted off the car. The girl was taken to a local hospital and is out of danger.

The suspect was caught in a nearby orchard and is in police custody. The Police said that the car was registered as being out of use and had false plates. Digi24 reported that there were also smuggled cigarettes in the vehicle.

(Photo source: Facebook/Politia Romana)