A driver lost control of a Ferrari sports car traveling 120 mph along Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu this morning, slamming into a power pole that cut the car — which sells for up to $1 million — in half, according to authorities.
One man suffered minor injuries. He was identified as Stefan Erikssen, of Bel-Air, said Sgt. Philip Brooks of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
The sports car went airborne and struck a power pole 5 to 10 feet off the ground, Brooks said. The car was demolished, but two air bags deployed.
I think that they meant to say the car was CAPABLE of going 200mph.
"You pay a million bucks for a car, you expect safety," Brooks said.
Investigators said they believe the driver was alone in the car and was engaged in a street race at the time of the accident. Erikssen told them the driver of the car fled on foot, but a search turned up no one, Brooks said.
The crash took place about 6:15 a.m. near Decker Canyon Road, an exclusive area of multimillion-dollar estates overlooking the Pacific in west Malibu, near Leo Carrillo State Beach.
The car — reportedly a Ferrari Enzo worth between $600,000 and $1 million — has a top speed of more than 200 mph.
Traffic on PCH was disrupted this morning during the investigation of the incident.
Brooks said the area is not known for street racing.
"We get some speed violations, but nothing over 70 mph," Brooks said.
Ferrari estimated to be going 200 mph in CA crashes
Moderator: S2k Moderators
So Speedy, So Exclusive, So Expensive, So Totaled
By Bob Pool, Times Staff Writer
It was a SigAlert made for Malibu.
A red Ferrari Enzo — one of only 400 ever made and worth more than $1 million — broke apart Tuesday when it crested a hill on Pacific Coast Highway going 120 mph and slammed into a power pole.
The driver jumped out of the wreckage and ran into the canyon above, evading a three-hour search by a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department helicopter and a mountain search-and-rescue team.
The crash did not result in serious injuries. But it sent shockwaves through both the tabloid and exotic car worlds as one group wondered if the driver was a celebrity and the other mourned the loss of a hand-built car revered by many as a work of art.
The car was certain to be owned by someone rich, if not famous. Actor Nicolas Cage owns one. And Malibu local Britney Spears has been chased in a Ferrari by the paparazzi.
But by day's end the tabloids were disappointed to learn that the demolished car had been owned by a Swedish millionaire without a Screen Actors Guild card.
Sheriff's investigators identified him as 44-year-old Stefan Eriksson, a Bel-Air resident. Officials are trying to determine whether he is the noted Swedish game designer whose firm, perhaps not surprisingly, was involved with car-racing themed video games.
Authorities said Eriksson said he was a passenger in the Ferrari, which he said was being driven by a German acquaintance he knew only as Dietrich.
One witness told deputies that the Ferrari appeared to be racing with a Mercedes-Benz SLR northbound along the coastal highway when the accident occurred about 6 a.m. west of Decker Road.
"It took out the pole, and part of the car went another 600 feet," Sheriff's Sgt. Philip Brooks said. "There were 1,200 feet of debris out there."
Eriksson told authorities that "Dietrich" ran up a hill toward the canyon road and disappeared. Brooks said detectives are far from convinced they have the whole story.
Eriksson "had a .09 blood-alcohol level, but if he's a passenger, that's OK," Brooks said. "But he had a bloody lip, and only the air bag on the driver's side had blood on it. The passenger-side air bag did not. My Scooby-Doo detectives are looking closely into that.
"Maybe the 'driver' had a friend who picked him up. Maybe he thumbed a ride," the sergeant added. "Maybe he was a ghost."
The crash left Ferrari fans anguished.
"I'm not surprised the driver ran away. He'd have been strangled by the owner," said Tex Otto, a Santa Monica graphic artist who edits two magazines for Ferrari owners.
"This will have a big impact on the local Ferrari community. This was not a car. It was a rolling art form."
Ferrari owner Chris Banning, a Beverly Hills writer who is finishing a book called the "Mulholland Experience" that will touch on the cult of sports car racing on that mountain roadway, characterized the Enzo's destruction as "a tremendous loss" to the automotive world.
"He destroyed one of the finest cars on Earth, maybe the finest. It's like taking a Van Gogh painting and burning it," said Banning, who is a leader of the Ferrari Owners Club.
Gil Lucero, a Mountain View telecommunications company executive who is president and Pacific region chairman of the Ferrari Club of America, said only 399 Enzos were at first scheduled to be assembled at the factory between 2002 and 2004, each priced at $670,000.
But a final car was built and donated to Pope John Paul II and later sold to raise $1,275,000 million for charity, Lucero said.
"It's a shame this one is gone forever. When one of these is lost, it reverberates through the whole exotic car world," Lucero said.
Ferrari fan Wally Clark, a Villa Park insurance broker who owns two Ferraris — neither of which is an Enzo — said used Enzos fetch between $1 million and $1.5 million.
"I think the price went up another $100,000 with today's crash," he said.
The Enzo model "is a very serious car" whose 660-horsepower V-12 engine can accelerate from zero to 65 mph in about four seconds, Clark said. It can exceed 217 mph.
"They'll burn rubber in every gear. You need to know what you're doing if you drive them on the street. You can't be blowing past people at 180 miles per hour on the freeway. You'll cause chain-reaction crashes behind you. I don't know who the yahoos were in it. It's a damn good thing they weren't killed."
Die-hard Ferrari aficionados who viewed TV news footage of the crash said the Enzo's driver-safety system performed exactly as it was designed to.
"The car has a carbon-fiber tub seating area. The driver's compartment is made of this very tough, lightweight carbon composite and has tremendous seats that really hold you in place," said Times automobile critic Dan Neil, who drove an Enzo at Ferrari's plant in Italy.
"They're very unforgiving cars. High performance but merciless," Neil said.
Websites devoted to exotic cars followed crash developments breathlessly through the day, even posting digital photos and eyewitness accounts sent in by people who passed by the wreck.
Brooks said that no arrests had been made and that little was known about Eriksson. Detectives were also trying to determine whether he was the Stefan Eriksson who in the past has raced Ferraris on European tracks.
The Sheriff's Department impounded the shredded remains of the Ferrari as evidence. But Brooks said he retrieved one souvenir from the side of the road.
"I have the mirror from the car," he joked. "It's shattered, but I think it's worth $5,000. I'm going to hang onto it."
Detectives are also trying to find the driver of the Mercedes that they think was dueling the Enzo.
If their race theory is correct, it won't be the first time a Mercedes beat a Ferrari.
By Bob Pool, Times Staff Writer
It was a SigAlert made for Malibu.
A red Ferrari Enzo — one of only 400 ever made and worth more than $1 million — broke apart Tuesday when it crested a hill on Pacific Coast Highway going 120 mph and slammed into a power pole.
The driver jumped out of the wreckage and ran into the canyon above, evading a three-hour search by a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department helicopter and a mountain search-and-rescue team.
The crash did not result in serious injuries. But it sent shockwaves through both the tabloid and exotic car worlds as one group wondered if the driver was a celebrity and the other mourned the loss of a hand-built car revered by many as a work of art.
The car was certain to be owned by someone rich, if not famous. Actor Nicolas Cage owns one. And Malibu local Britney Spears has been chased in a Ferrari by the paparazzi.
But by day's end the tabloids were disappointed to learn that the demolished car had been owned by a Swedish millionaire without a Screen Actors Guild card.
Sheriff's investigators identified him as 44-year-old Stefan Eriksson, a Bel-Air resident. Officials are trying to determine whether he is the noted Swedish game designer whose firm, perhaps not surprisingly, was involved with car-racing themed video games.
Authorities said Eriksson said he was a passenger in the Ferrari, which he said was being driven by a German acquaintance he knew only as Dietrich.
One witness told deputies that the Ferrari appeared to be racing with a Mercedes-Benz SLR northbound along the coastal highway when the accident occurred about 6 a.m. west of Decker Road.
"It took out the pole, and part of the car went another 600 feet," Sheriff's Sgt. Philip Brooks said. "There were 1,200 feet of debris out there."
Eriksson told authorities that "Dietrich" ran up a hill toward the canyon road and disappeared. Brooks said detectives are far from convinced they have the whole story.
Eriksson "had a .09 blood-alcohol level, but if he's a passenger, that's OK," Brooks said. "But he had a bloody lip, and only the air bag on the driver's side had blood on it. The passenger-side air bag did not. My Scooby-Doo detectives are looking closely into that.
"Maybe the 'driver' had a friend who picked him up. Maybe he thumbed a ride," the sergeant added. "Maybe he was a ghost."
The crash left Ferrari fans anguished.
"I'm not surprised the driver ran away. He'd have been strangled by the owner," said Tex Otto, a Santa Monica graphic artist who edits two magazines for Ferrari owners.
"This will have a big impact on the local Ferrari community. This was not a car. It was a rolling art form."
Ferrari owner Chris Banning, a Beverly Hills writer who is finishing a book called the "Mulholland Experience" that will touch on the cult of sports car racing on that mountain roadway, characterized the Enzo's destruction as "a tremendous loss" to the automotive world.
"He destroyed one of the finest cars on Earth, maybe the finest. It's like taking a Van Gogh painting and burning it," said Banning, who is a leader of the Ferrari Owners Club.
Gil Lucero, a Mountain View telecommunications company executive who is president and Pacific region chairman of the Ferrari Club of America, said only 399 Enzos were at first scheduled to be assembled at the factory between 2002 and 2004, each priced at $670,000.
But a final car was built and donated to Pope John Paul II and later sold to raise $1,275,000 million for charity, Lucero said.
"It's a shame this one is gone forever. When one of these is lost, it reverberates through the whole exotic car world," Lucero said.
Ferrari fan Wally Clark, a Villa Park insurance broker who owns two Ferraris — neither of which is an Enzo — said used Enzos fetch between $1 million and $1.5 million.
"I think the price went up another $100,000 with today's crash," he said.
The Enzo model "is a very serious car" whose 660-horsepower V-12 engine can accelerate from zero to 65 mph in about four seconds, Clark said. It can exceed 217 mph.
"They'll burn rubber in every gear. You need to know what you're doing if you drive them on the street. You can't be blowing past people at 180 miles per hour on the freeway. You'll cause chain-reaction crashes behind you. I don't know who the yahoos were in it. It's a damn good thing they weren't killed."
Die-hard Ferrari aficionados who viewed TV news footage of the crash said the Enzo's driver-safety system performed exactly as it was designed to.
"The car has a carbon-fiber tub seating area. The driver's compartment is made of this very tough, lightweight carbon composite and has tremendous seats that really hold you in place," said Times automobile critic Dan Neil, who drove an Enzo at Ferrari's plant in Italy.
"They're very unforgiving cars. High performance but merciless," Neil said.
Websites devoted to exotic cars followed crash developments breathlessly through the day, even posting digital photos and eyewitness accounts sent in by people who passed by the wreck.
Brooks said that no arrests had been made and that little was known about Eriksson. Detectives were also trying to determine whether he was the Stefan Eriksson who in the past has raced Ferraris on European tracks.
The Sheriff's Department impounded the shredded remains of the Ferrari as evidence. But Brooks said he retrieved one souvenir from the side of the road.
"I have the mirror from the car," he joked. "It's shattered, but I think it's worth $5,000. I'm going to hang onto it."
Detectives are also trying to find the driver of the Mercedes that they think was dueling the Enzo.
If their race theory is correct, it won't be the first time a Mercedes beat a Ferrari.
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Scorpion
The mystery deepened Monday in the case of the puzzling crash last week of a $1-million Ferrari Enzo on Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu.
Sheriff's detectives said Monday that they believe a gun's magazine discovered near the wreckage is connected to the crash, and they plan to interview an unnamed person who they believe was in the car with Swedish game machine entrepreneur Stefan Eriksson.
The crash has also garnered the attention of a leading Scottish bank, which has informed sheriff's investigators that it may own the destroyed car. At the same time, detectives are trying to figure out why another exotic car in Eriksson's extensive collection, a Mercedes SLR, was listed as stolen by Scotland Yard in London, said Sheriff's Sgt. Phil Brooks.
The totaled Ferrari was one of two Enzos that Eriksson brought into the United States from England along with the Mercedes SLR, Brooks said. But detectives concluded that the totaled vehicle did not have appropriate papers and was not "street legal" for driving in California, he said.
Detectives have been trying for nearly a week to sort out what exactly happened last Tuesday morning when Eriksson's Enzo — one of only 400 ever made — smashed into a telephone pole, totaling the car. Eriksson told deputies that he was the passenger and that a man he knew only as "Dietrich" was behind the wheel. But detectives have been openly skeptical of the story, noting that Eriksson had a bloody lip and that the only blood they found in the car was on the driver's-side air bag.
Brooks said detectives have called in Eriksson for another interview. Eriksson has declined through the security guard at his gated Bel-Air estate to comment. An attorney who has previously represented Eriksson in civil matters, Ashley Posner, also declined to comment Monday.
But some city leaders in Malibu, where the crash has been the talk of the town, were less circumspect.
"The guy should have had an IQ test," said Malibu Mayor Pro Tem Ken Kearsley, who has been following the coverage of the crash with a half-grin. The driver's IQ "couldn't come up above 60 if he was doing 120 on PCH," Kearsley said.
But in fact, Brooks said Monday, the car was traveling 162 mph when it crashed, far faster than the 120 mph originally believed. The Ferrari, with just a few inches of undercarriage clearance, hit a bump at a crest in the road, sending the vehicle airborne and into the power pole, Brooks said.
Brooks said they are investigating whether someone else may have been present and are trying to determine whether the recovered gun component is connected to the case. He declined to say more about the find or elaborate on the status of the Scottish bank and Scotland Yard in the case.
The question of whether Eriksson was the driver is key to the case, Brooks said. Eriksson's blood-alcohol level was 0.09%, higher than the legal limit for operating a motor vehicle.
Sheriff's officials are still trying to confirm witness reports that the Ferrari might have been drag racing with another car, and officials aren't sure if that's what happened.
Sheriff's officials said Eriksson was an executive with a game company that attempted to take on Sony and Nintendo, but the firm collapsed last year.
In Malibu, officials said they are not sure what to make of the accident.
Kearsley said the stretch of road was not known for drag racing, but for run-of-the-mill speeders. He said the Sheriff's Department has had success for the last year and a half using radar and lasers to catch overzealous drivers. The lasers are not detectable to drivers, he said.
"It's straight as an arrow where the accident was," he said. "You really have to go out of your way to hit a telephone pole."
Carol Moss, a longtime Malibu resident, activist and meditation group leader, said the accident came as no surprise.
"It was horrendous, but Malibu is full of idiots," she said. "There are a lot of wild cars and irresponsible people. The roads are dangerous. You always see people with those sorts of cars. You see some wild behavior."
But, in keeping with her Zen frame of mind, Moss extended an olive branch. "Everyone is welcome to attend the meditation group. Even the drag racer."
Sheriff's detectives said Monday that they believe a gun's magazine discovered near the wreckage is connected to the crash, and they plan to interview an unnamed person who they believe was in the car with Swedish game machine entrepreneur Stefan Eriksson.
The crash has also garnered the attention of a leading Scottish bank, which has informed sheriff's investigators that it may own the destroyed car. At the same time, detectives are trying to figure out why another exotic car in Eriksson's extensive collection, a Mercedes SLR, was listed as stolen by Scotland Yard in London, said Sheriff's Sgt. Phil Brooks.
The totaled Ferrari was one of two Enzos that Eriksson brought into the United States from England along with the Mercedes SLR, Brooks said. But detectives concluded that the totaled vehicle did not have appropriate papers and was not "street legal" for driving in California, he said.
Detectives have been trying for nearly a week to sort out what exactly happened last Tuesday morning when Eriksson's Enzo — one of only 400 ever made — smashed into a telephone pole, totaling the car. Eriksson told deputies that he was the passenger and that a man he knew only as "Dietrich" was behind the wheel. But detectives have been openly skeptical of the story, noting that Eriksson had a bloody lip and that the only blood they found in the car was on the driver's-side air bag.
Brooks said detectives have called in Eriksson for another interview. Eriksson has declined through the security guard at his gated Bel-Air estate to comment. An attorney who has previously represented Eriksson in civil matters, Ashley Posner, also declined to comment Monday.
But some city leaders in Malibu, where the crash has been the talk of the town, were less circumspect.
"The guy should have had an IQ test," said Malibu Mayor Pro Tem Ken Kearsley, who has been following the coverage of the crash with a half-grin. The driver's IQ "couldn't come up above 60 if he was doing 120 on PCH," Kearsley said.
But in fact, Brooks said Monday, the car was traveling 162 mph when it crashed, far faster than the 120 mph originally believed. The Ferrari, with just a few inches of undercarriage clearance, hit a bump at a crest in the road, sending the vehicle airborne and into the power pole, Brooks said.
Brooks said they are investigating whether someone else may have been present and are trying to determine whether the recovered gun component is connected to the case. He declined to say more about the find or elaborate on the status of the Scottish bank and Scotland Yard in the case.
The question of whether Eriksson was the driver is key to the case, Brooks said. Eriksson's blood-alcohol level was 0.09%, higher than the legal limit for operating a motor vehicle.
Sheriff's officials are still trying to confirm witness reports that the Ferrari might have been drag racing with another car, and officials aren't sure if that's what happened.
Sheriff's officials said Eriksson was an executive with a game company that attempted to take on Sony and Nintendo, but the firm collapsed last year.
In Malibu, officials said they are not sure what to make of the accident.
Kearsley said the stretch of road was not known for drag racing, but for run-of-the-mill speeders. He said the Sheriff's Department has had success for the last year and a half using radar and lasers to catch overzealous drivers. The lasers are not detectable to drivers, he said.
"It's straight as an arrow where the accident was," he said. "You really have to go out of your way to hit a telephone pole."
Carol Moss, a longtime Malibu resident, activist and meditation group leader, said the accident came as no surprise.
"It was horrendous, but Malibu is full of idiots," she said. "There are a lot of wild cars and irresponsible people. The roads are dangerous. You always see people with those sorts of cars. You see some wild behavior."
But, in keeping with her Zen frame of mind, Moss extended an olive branch. "Everyone is welcome to attend the meditation group. Even the drag racer."
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LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- The Swedish video game entrepreneur involved in the 162-mph crash of a rare Ferrari has been arrested on suspicion of grand theft, officials said.
Detectives concluded that the wrecked Enzo Ferrari -- one of only 400 made -- along with a Mercedes and another Enzo Ferrari in Stefan Eriksson's collection were actually owned by British financial institutions, said sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore.
Eriksson apparently brought the cars to Los Angeles when he moved from Britain last year, but the financial institutions that held the titles said his payments had lapsed.
Authorities have said the $600,000 Mercedes had been reported to London's Scotland Yard. The Ferrari was worth more than $1 million.
All three cars have been confiscated, and Eriksson, 44, was arrested at his Bel-Air home Saturday, Whitmore said.
He is being held without bail because U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement put a hold him, the Los Angeles Times reported in Monday editions.
The Ferrari crash spun into a web of mystery when Eriksson told authorities that he was only a passenger in the car and that the driver was a German acquaintance he knew only as Dietrich. He said Dietrich ran into the hills, but a search by sheriff's deputies turned up no one.
Officials have questioned Eriksson's story, noting that only the driver's side air bag had blood on it and Eriksson had a cut lip. The front of the red Ferrari crumpled when it slammed into a poll on the Pacific Coast Highway on February 21.
Eriksson was an executive with Gizmondo, a European video game company that filed for bankruptcy.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/04/10/ferrar ... index.html
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Strange saga of smashed Ferrari back in court
Swedish entrepreneur due in court Monday for arraignment
Monday, May 15, 2006; Posted: 2:00 p.m. EDT (18:00 GMT)
A rare, red Enzo Ferrari was virtually cut in half after smashing into a utility pole along Pacific Coast Highway.
LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- It's the smash up that car lovers can't seem to get enough of -- an exquisite red Ferrari, rare by even its own lofty standards, gets shredded in a 162 mph crash on Pacific Coast Highway.
First came a simple question: How could anyone plow their car into a utility pole at that speed and survive with just a cut lip, as Swedish businessman Bo Stefan Eriksson did?
From there, the case has developed more turns than the winding route authorities say Eriksson couldn't navigate on the morning of February 21.
First there was a mysterious German man named Dietrich. Eriksson told authorities he was Dietrich's passenger -- that he let Dietrich take the $1.5 million Ferrari Enzo out for a pre-dawn spin even though he didn't know Dietrich's last name or where to find him after he wrecked the car.
Things got even more odd when two "Homeland Security" men showed up after the crash, demanding to talk to Eriksson. It turned out they actually worked security for the San Gabriel Valley Transit Authority, a small bus company in the suburbs.
Eriksson told authorities he was a deputy commissioner with the authority's anti-terrorism division, although most of his previous experience with law enforcement appears to be the five years he spent in a Swedish prison in the 1990s for assault, extortion and other crimes.
On Tuesday, authorities raided the headquarters of the bus company, took one man into custody and seized guns, badges and police jackets. Eriksson's tie to the company is under investigation.
Digging deeper, authorities uncovered Eriksson's connections to a bankrupt European video game company he once helped run, his convictions for assault and other crimes in Sweden.
Ericksson, in custody on a federal immigration hold, appeared in court Monday, but his arraignment on charges of embezzlement, grand theft, drunken driving and being a felon in possession of a firearm was postponed to May 30.
The investigation has widened to include Carl Freer, a former business associate of Eriksson's and a member of the transit authority's "anti-terrorism unit." He is accused of posing as a police officer to buy a gun; Freer's attorney has denied wrongdoing on behalf of his client.
It all began with the wreck of a car so exclusive it was named after company founder Enzo Ferrari. Only 400 were made between 2002 and 2004.
Eriksson, 44, somehow wound up with two Enzos, as well as a Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren. Police have confiscated the cars and accuse him of stealing all three, which they say were worth $3.8 million.
His lawyer didn't return a call for comment, but he said at a pretrial hearing earlier in the month that Eriksson wasn't trying to steal the cars when he shipped them from Great Britain under other people's names.
The lawyer said Eriksson, who still owed more than $500,000 on the cars, only quit paying the banks after his company, Gizmondo Europe Ltd., went broke last year.
The Ferrari crash wasn't Eriksson's first problem with expensive cars. He has been charged with driving a Porsche Cayenne that rear-ended a Ford Explorer on January 4 -- more than a month before the Ferrari spill.
Ultimately, it was his penchant for fast cars that landed Eriksson in jail here. If he'd crashed a Volkswagen Beetle instead of a Ferrari, he might have remained under the radar.
"I would rank it as probably the most incredible exotic car crash in history," said Greg Carlson, whose Web site, wreckedexotics.com, keeps track of such things.
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