Italian police arrested three men Wednesday as part of an ongoing investigation into a cable car crash Sunday that killed 14.
The gondola crashed to the ground near the town of Stresa, killing everyone on board except a five-year-old Israeli boy who is still hospitalized.
According to reports, the cable car was about to reach the top of Mottarone mountain when the lead cable broke. The car slipped backward before falling to the ground, where it rolled over before stopping.
Italian prosecutors are looking into suspected involuntary manslaughter and negligence charges.
One Carabinieri official, Lieutenant Colonel Alberto Cicognani, told Italian television that the operators of the cable car had disabled the brake system.
“It is certainly very serious and very disturbing,” Olimpia Bossi, the chief prosecutor of the city of Verbania, told reporters after the arrests.
“With the conviction that the cable car would never break, [the men] took the risk which determined the deadly outcome,” Bossi said.
Arrested were the manager of Ferrovie Mottarone, the company that operates the cable car, its director, and the site manager.
Reuters reported the system underwent major maintenance work in 2014 and 2016, with checks performed in 2017 and last year.
The company has not commented on the arrests.
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