Moscow's traffic cops have declared war on the city's “golden youth,” after videos of adolescents speeding in luxury cars through the city went viral on Russian social media.
A clip of a Lamborghini speeding down Moscow's Kutuzovsky Prospekt, and another of a BMW driving through the pedestrian area at Muzeon Park, caused outrage when they went viral on Instagram.
Traffic police chief Viktor Nilov said that they
needed to punish the perpetrators to “set an example,” the Interfax news agency reported Thursday.
"We
need to say that this kind of behavior isn't fashionable, it's
unacceptable,” said “We need
to educate young people so that they feel a sense of disgust at
this."
Nilov also advised young Muscovites not to share online videos which glorified irresponsible driving, claiming that it inspired copycats.
It isn't the first time that Moscow's privileged teenagers have attracted the police's ire.
Twenty-year-old Ruslan Shamsuarov, the son of Lukoil's deputy president, caused a national scandal when in April he took police on a five-hour car chase in his Mercedes-Benz G-Class with a group of friends, streaming the encounter on the Periscope mobile app.
Shamsuarov then joked when the driver was handed a 5,000 ruble ($76) fine, laughing "What are they going to do to us? Nothing!"
The stunt inspired Moscow's police
chief Anatoly Yakunin to declare a similar zero-tolerance policy
on "those who think money can buy them everything
and everyone."
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