Police report busy on May Day, investigate accidents in Helsinki and Hyvinkää | News
Three people were injured while driving while intoxicated in a congested area in Helsinki, while one was killed and three were injured in a motorway crash.
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Police said in many areas in Finland they were busy on Saturday night due to drunken and harassing behavior when residents celebrated their first May Day unrestricted after 2019.
Helsinki police answered more than 300 calls during the Vappu celebrations on Saturday night and early Sunday. In their statement, they described the night as “a return to the pre-coronary virus of the last decade.”
According to the Central Finnish police, May Day was also much busier than in the previous two years, as restaurants were allowed to be open late.
However, the police in Eastern Finland told the news agency STT that the party went more peacefully than on the last day of May Day. This may have been due in part to the weather. In Kuopio, for example, it was frosty at night.
3 were injured by a reckless driver near the Esplanade
Most of Helsinki’s police duties were related to public indiscipline and fighting. Domestic litigation played a smaller role.
The most serious incident occurred at about 7 p.m., when a man was driving at high speed through the city center and collided with eight cars on Pohjoisesplanadi, one of the parallel boulevards along Esplanadi Park.
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Adjacent to the area is the Havis Amanda Statue and the Market Square, traditionally the center of May Day. Authorities estimate that tens of thousands of people had gathered in the area.
Three people were injured, including the suspect. Social media videos show how the man resisted and shouted as four police officers crashed him to the ground in the middle of the street after the last collision.
Helsinki police suspect the 33-year-old man of serious danger to traffic safety, serious drunk driving, serious bodily injury, opposition to the official and disobedience, the police informs.
Police said the suspect endangered the safety of several bystanders while driving. However, they did not believe that he was deliberately trying to drive over people.
Police said the patrol told the driver to stop at the North Shore in Kruununhaka, but he did not.
According to Yle’s reporter, the black car was driving at high speed from Aleksanterinkatu to Unioninkatu and from there to Pohjoisesplanadi.
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The suspect’s car eventually collided with another car outside Café Esplanadi at Pohjoisesplanadi 37. The park area outside the café was completely destroyed and the car collided with the wall of the café.
All of the injured received hospital treatment, but were later released from the hospital, police said.
“Police have collected a lot of video and eyewitness findings from the scene, which are being reviewed. In addition, discussions with victims and eyewitnesses are continuing,” the criminal commissioner said. Kalle da Silva Gonçalves told Yle.
According to Ilta-Sanomat, the man drove a black Mercedes-Benz, the owner of which has worked for the state and ran in the parliamentary party’s parliamentary elections. Iltalehti reports that the man is a civil servant who has completed two university degrees and has acted as an assistant to a MEP.
Helsinki police confirmed to Iltalehti that the car had not been stolen in the crash. However, they refused to say whether the car owner was behind the wheel at the time.
1 died, 3 were injured in a crash in Hyvinkää
In Hyvinkää, Central Uusimaa, one person was killed and three were injured in a two-car crash on a highway at 3 a.m. on Sunday. According to the rescue service, all the injured were taken to hospital.
Police corrected an earlier statement on Sunday that four people were injured.
There was three people in one car and one in another car that collided with it from behind. There was a dead person and two injured in the front car. Both cars were in the south lane. Police are investigating the accident.
14.04 and 17.31: More information on the Helsinki case.
14.53 and 18.08: More information about the Hyvinkää accident.