London Evening Standard/London
A young motorbike enthusiast and his teenage pillion passenger have been killed and a pedestrian seriously injured in a horrific crash in east London.
Justas Pranckunas, 20, and Redas Dainys, 16, collided with a man crossing Woodford Avenue in Clayhall, near Ilford. The pair were thrown several metres down the dual carriageway.
Neighbours rushed to help, covering the victims with blankets. Witnesses said paramedics performed surgery at the roadside but the pair were pronounced dead at the scene.
Mourners gathered there on Sunday night.
Many broke down in tears at a bus stop that has been covered with flowers and candles. Friends said it was the first time Redas, from Clayhall, had ever been on a motorbike, and it had been his dream to own one.
The pair were at a friend’s birthday barbecue on Saturday afternoon when Redas, of Upney, Essex, asked Pranckunas to take him for a ride.
Friends said Pranckunas, who had been riding since he was 16, was safety-conscious and had ensured Redas was wearing a helmet and protective clothing. They realised something was wrong when the pair were not back an hour later. A group who went to look for them ran into the police cordon.
Redas was studying a sports course at Epping Forest College. His mother was at the scene on Sunday night, but was too distressed to speak. Fellow student Edvinas Sysoletinas, 16, said: “Redas was my best friend. When he turned 16 he told me he was going to buy a moped. All his life he wanted to get a motorbike. He said I’m going to get a motorbike and we are going to ride together — that was our dream.”
Pranckunas, a former pupil of Eastbury comprehensive school in Barking, was completing a computer networking course at Greenwich University and worked at Homebase in Dagenham to fund his studies.
He was a member of Lithuanian motorbike group Sons of East, many of whom arrived to pay their respects.
His mother Virginija Pranckuniene, 38, and father Alfredas Pranckunas, 39, who run a grocery business, were on holiday in Tenerife when they were told of his death and rushed back to Britain. Virginija Pranckuniene said: “He was my big love. My first love and my first child. His little sister loved him so much. She’d come back from school and he would lift her on his shoulders and help with her homework. Everyone cries for him. He was a really good man.
His girlfriend Ausrine Peseckaite, 21, from Romford, said: “Everyone will remember him with a smile. It was his last year at university. He said we were going to move in together. We are still together. We are going up on a road — I’m at the beginning and he’s at the end waiting for me.”
