Police are hunting a van driver believed to have been involved in the fatal stabbing of a food delivery rider in a suspected road rage incident.
The moped rider, who was named today as Takieddine Boudhane, 30, had been driving when he was stabbed in Finsbury Park north London, on Friday evening.
Police said the Uber Eats and Deliveroo driver was involved in an altercation with the driver of a white van at the junction of Lennox Road and Charteris Road.
The white VW Caddy panel-type van was found in Islington today and taken in for forensics.
DCI Neil John appealed for anyone who witnessed the incident to come forward, including anyone with mobile phone footage.
‘The driver and person believed responsible for this tragic matter is now the subject of a police manhunt,’ he said.
‘The incident itself appears to have been spontaneous and not connected to, or as a result of, anything other than a traffic altercation.
‘At this time I am unable to release any further information concerning the identity of the driver as this may hinder the ongoing police investigation.’
Friends and colleagues of Mr Boudhane, an Algerian national who had been living in the UK for around three years, have called for better protection for delivery drivers.
Zakaria Gherabi, 37, who also works for Deliveroo and Uber, said drivers were vulnerable to attacks and are considered ‘less valuable’ than the food they carry when he visited the scene of his friend’s death.
He said he was punched so hard his eye was dislocated from its socket while working in October, adding: ‘My attackers are still on the streets. The police do nothing.
‘It happens. Nobody is going to save you. The company does not care, we are self-employed, but the food we are carrying is insured.’
Sourin Aydi said Mr Boudhane was his ‘best friend’, adding: ‘I can’t believe it, I did not sleep last night.’
He was a wonderful man, funny with a great sense of humour and always laughing.
‘If you have a bike then you are a target.’
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, whose constituency includes Finsbury Park, visited the scene on Saturday.
He told reporters: People should not be carrying knives. A human life has been taken.’
No arrests have been made and inquiries continue into what is the Met’s first murder investigation of 2020.
Formal identification has yet to take place but police have informed Mr Boudhane’s next of kin.
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