Father lets 9-year-old drive SUV through Marseille rush hour
Police stopped a nine-year-old who was driving a heavy SUV in Marseille’s rush-hour traffic after his father let him behind the wheel without seatbelts.
In Marseille, police intercepted a nine-year-old operating a two-ton SUV during the afternoon rush after a motorcycle unit observed the vehicle swerving in hazardous patterns. The child’s 53-year-old father sat beside him, gripping the wheel while a younger sibling rested on the passenger-seat lap, and neither child wore a seatbelt, enabling the boy to reach the controls. The SUV scraped near-parked cars several times, prompting officers to warn that a severe crash could have occurred on the busy road.
The father was taken to the station and charged with assisting a criminal act and violating weapons law after officers discovered a banned spring knife in the passenger-door compartment. The boy was quickly handed over to his mother. Police said they prevented a potentially disastrous collision.
Why it matters
The incident underscores serious child-safety and illegal driving risks in urban traffic.
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