To check if car was repaired, cops to visit service centres

With no crucial leads in the Mercedes hit-and-run case, barring the logo and the broken pieces of the front grill of the car, the Delhi Police have to rely on the arduous process of physical verifications and to do the same, the police are visiting several Mercedes service and repair centres to check if the accused had got his car repaired in any of them.

The physical checking is being done as the cops are also blindsided by the lack of CCTV footages. Despite the fact that there are multiple CCTV cameras along the stretch of GH9 market area, none of the cameras have captured the accident.

"We have formed several teams to carry out investigation. We are planning on approaching all the Mercedes workshops across Delhi-NCR region and make the list of people who had repaired their Mercedes cars. The list will comprise repairs in the last 36 hours and we will also approach the local mechanics just in case the accused may have approached them to fix his grill," said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Outer) Rishi Pal.

However, the investigators say that this form of investigation is a long drawn process and they may face problems after two-three days as it will become tough for them to ascertain if the accused was drunk during the accident or not.

"As time passes, the accused will have a chance to flush the alcohol from his system in 24-hours. It will become tough to ascertain if the driver was drunk through medical tests. It takes 36 hours or so to detect alcohol in the body or else if we don't find traces, we can also use the hair sample of the accused to trace the alcohol content for another 90 days," said a police source privy to the investigation.

Since there are no CCTV footages that captured the accident, the police have to rely on eye-witness testimonies to trace the car. Some of the eye-witnesses in their statement have reported that the car was of silver make and was being driven at a speed of approximately more than 100 kmph.

The routes that can be used for the escape are also being analysed but so far, no footage has come to the fore identifying the car. The police have also made contingency plans. If the Mercedes shop verifications fail, then the police will start the physical verification of all Delhi and NCR based Mercedes owners.

The elusive Mercedes car was involved in a hit-and-run case on Sunday night when the 17-year-old son of a DDA employee was hit by the car and dragged several metres by the car.