The 19-year-old driver of the Mini Cooper that crashed into a scooter and killed three people in Kochi on October 11 was driving with a blood alcohol level at least five times the legal limit, according to his blood test report, police said on Friday.
Police have said in the remand report filed before the court in Angamaly that the accused has significant social and financial influence and can influence witnesses if released on bail. Suhail was apprehended by locals and handed over to the police. Suhail has been booked for culpable homicide not amounting to murder. Police are likely to file an application in court seeking their custody for questioning. Police have found CCTV footage of Suhail and his friends consuming liquor at the three bars. The protest march was stopped by the police. The Mini Cooper was gifted to Suhail by his mother on his birthday this year.
“The BAC limit for driving in India is 30 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood. Suhail’s blood sample, taken following the incident on Oct 11, showed levels of five times the legal limit. In the early hours of October 11, a speeding black Mini Cooper, driven by Suhail, rammed into the back of a scooter while navigating a curve on the road leading to Cochin International Airport near Nedumbassery. Earlier, Suhail and his friend Ninav had been arrested by the police and produced before a magistrate, who remanded them to the Borstal school in Thrikkakara, where remand prisoners between 18 and 21 are lodged. Police have found that Suhail and his friends visited at least three bars in Kochi on October 10 and consumed alcohol before meeting two other friends at a third bar near Cochin International Airport in Nedumbassery on the intervening night of October 10 and 11. Officers said that the Mini Cooper Suhail was driving was travelling at 120 km/hr at the time of the crash. The maximum speed limit on the Cochin airport road is 80 km/hr.
It shows he was highly intoxicated,” a senior officer in Ernakulam told HT. Meanwhile, the SFI, the students’ wing of the CPI(M), carried out a protest march to the boutique run by Suhail’s mother, Nooha Sajeev, in Kochi on Friday.
