Tragedy ·
The driver who left after Davide Rebellin’s fatal collision
The recently retired cyclist was killed during a training ride in November 2022. A Vicenza court later convicted the truck driver and sentenced him to four years in prison.
Davide Rebellin was training on his bicycle near Montebello Vicentino in northern Italy on November 30, 2022, when a truck struck and killed him. He was 51 and had recently ended a professional cycling career spanning three decades. The vehicle did not stop after the collision, which Il Gazzettino placed shortly before midday.
Police began looking for the truck and its driver while reconstructing what had happened. Road.cc, citing Il Gazzettino, reported that the motorist had been exiting a roundabout. It also described an early investigative theory that the driver might have been unaware of the collision—not an established account of what he knew.
The truck driver left the scene and returned to Germany, according to Kronen Zeitung’s later account of the case. Wanted under a European arrest warrant, he surrendered to the authorities seven months after the collision and was detained in Vicenza prison. He was charged with road traffic homicide and failure to render assistance.
On October 14, 2024, Kronen Zeitung reported that a regional court in Vicenza had found the 64-year-old driver guilty of running over Rebellin and committing a hit-and-run.
The prosecution had sought five years in prison. The court sentenced the driver to four.