Italian prosecutors have dropped
charges against a 28-year-old Italian tractor driver who ran
over and killed two young Moroccan women who were sleeping off a
night of drinking and drug taking in a cornfield near Milan on
July 3, judicial sources said Monday.
The prosecutors said it would have been impossible for the man
to have seen the women from his cabin since the corn, on which
he was spraying insecticide, was over two metres high.
The accident happened at San Giuliano Milanese.
The friends of the young women who allegedly ran off without
calling for help may be charged with failing to assist people in
an emergency.
The victims have been named as Hanan Nekhla, 32, and Sara El
Jaafari, 28, whose lifeless bodies were found on a Saturday
night in the thickly cultivated maize field.
They are believed to have been sleeping, or perhaps knocked out
by the powerful insecticide, when a threshing machine pulled by
the tractor allegedly hit them.
The two women were homeless and sleeping with friends or family,
sources said.
Empty beer bottles and tin foil perhaps used to consume drugs
were found beside their bodies.
The farm worker, who has not been named, has been placed under
investigation for manslaughter as a formality, police said.
The man told police he felt nothing of any impact as he was
driving his tractor.
A cousin of the young women said they had been with two male
friends who "could have helped them".
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