The observatory Il Centauro – Asaps (Association in support of traffic police) has just revealed the data concerning the number of car accident in the first six months of 2011 in Italy. The report gives us both bad and good news; let's begin with the good ones: car accidents are diminishing. But the number of accidents caused by hit-and-run drivers is not decreasing, on the contrary, this phenomenon is still a very crucial one on Italian streets, and it seems to become more and more widespread. In the first six months of 2011 the number of hit-and run accidents has increased by 39%, 347 accidents in total. The number of victims was 55, with an increase by 44,7% in comparison to the first six months of 2011. Also the number of injured people makes us understand how serious the problem is: 418 is the total number of injured people. As far as the data concerning the different Italian regions are concerned, the regions where there has been the higher number of accidents caused by a hit-and-run driver is Lombardy (50 accidents), followed by Latium and Emilia Romagna, both with 38 accidents, Campania with 35, Tuscany with 32 and Veneto with 31. Also the percentage regarding the number of women that cause accidents and run away is increasing.
When the accident is caused by a hit-and-run driver, rage adds to the sorrow of the relatives and friends of the victim, and these feelings are fueled by the fact that it is not always possible to find out who has caused the accident and bring him/her to justice. In spite of the efforts of the police and of other people in charge of this, it is not always possible to identify the person that caused the accident. In the first six months of 2011 it was possible to do so in 66,3% of the cases, a lower percentage than last year, when the guilty driver was identified in 78,3% of the cases.
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One of the main reasons why hit-and-run drivers run away after causing an accident is that they have taken alcohol or drugs before. Among the hit-and-run drivers that have been identified, indeed, 20,4% had positive alcohol tests, and some of these people had also taken drugs (8% of the people that had a positive alcohol tests also tested positive for drugs). However, these data are approximate, and most probably they do not mirror reality: the situation might be much worse than that: many hit-and-run drivers, indeed, are taken, or give themselves up, after a certain time span, when the effects of drugs and alcohol are not traceable anymore.
In order to limit the number of accidents and victims caused by hit-and-run drivers, in September the Italian Parliament will discuss the introduction of the crime of road murder in the Highway Code. This crime would be punished with a sentence of 8 to 18 years, the definitive license withdrawal – in some cases – and the arrest in flagrante delicto.
