The pensioner Gref accelerates. So much so that he gets caught in a speed trap four times in a day. “I’m not fast,” as au ZH Blick’s Elmer Greif (78) explains.
But he admits: “I was a little late for all the appointments on that Saturday in June.” By appointments, Gref means moving people with disabilities around. “I am a jumper at Tixi Zurich, a transport service for the disabled.” On a voluntary basis, the pensioner insists on Gref. “I am very well. I want to give something back to people who are not doing so well.”
That’s why the well-being of their guests is their top priority, says the retired hotelier. “It bothers me when I think about how dressed a person in a wheelchair is already and who knows if his or her driver is coming.”
Flashed twice in less than a minute and a half To prevent this, driver Gref is on his way to a customer in a taxi car on the radar above on Saturday. It happened on his way: he was flashed twice on Wolfswinkel Street in Zurich-Aufoltern.
Greff recalls: “I missed a turn. When I saw it, I turned », says the native of Vorarlberg. “Only because of this maneuver was it possible for me to be caught by radar twice on the same road in less than a minute and a half: front and back.” There the speed limit is 30 km/h. Both times, Gref is faster.
On the same day, the speed trap for Griff is closed twice more during the tiki ride. He repented: “I should have looked at the speedometer more.”
Meanwhile, his boss Danielle Stutz (54), head of the transport service in Tixi Zurich, is taking the pressure off Greif. Stutz knows that mobility is the most important thing to Tixi customers. “These are people who are permanently immobile and can never use normal public transport.” But: “If a driver – for whatever reason – does not make his way, we can cancel a trip and pass it on to another driver. This relieves the driver in question. »
“Drivers are also observers at the same time” Stutz emphasizes: “As a driver, you just can’t let yourself be bothered.” However, he is aware that transporting people with physical or mental disabilities is a major challenge for taxi drivers. “Drivers are also observers at the same time.”
Stutz says of Greif’s events that they were “an unfortunate series of circumstances”. The dispatcher clarifies: “In ten years in Tixi, I’ve never seen one of our drivers get caught four times a day.” And: “We are very sorry about this incident.”
Pensioner Gref regrets that he made the pace too difficult. He has since paid for all four buses. Three times 40 francs and once 120 francs. “I know I made a mistake,” he says. “But I still wished the police would have met me and that mercy would have remained.”
But Mark Surber of Zurich city police, when asked by Blick, said that the situation that led to the violation of traffic rules could not be ignored. “The police have no discretion in this regard,” the spokesman said.
“ruthless, ignorant, selfish asshole” The authorities also showed no mercy for Gref’s an old crime. The pensioner says: “A car pushed me off the autobahn. I missed the license plate. Then I wrote an anonymous letter.”
In this letter, Greif reaches out verbally below the belt: “You, or whoever was driving your car on September 14th, are a reckless, ignorant, selfish asshole. Sometimes I get avenged for the harm I’ve done. ”
For the authorities, the matter is clear: Danger! Although he wrote the letter anonymously, the police track down Greif. “They picked me up at 6:45 a.m. and searched my office,” recalls the pensioner. Griffin is sentenced. “But I didn’t know that my words would be taken as a threat,” said the 78-year-old.
Greif is now telling his story to Blick for the following reasons: “I say my name and show my face because, as is well known, I’ve had bad experiences along an unknown path.”
