A woman was killed yesterday after her car was involved in a collision with a speeding Mercedes that was being pursued by police.

Four other people, including a two-year-old girl and a man with life-threatening injuries, were taken to hospital after the crash, which happened in the early hours of the morning in Shoreditch, East London.

The two male occupants of the Mercedes fled the scene but were arrested soon afterwards.

They had sped away from police after officers in an unmarked car turned on their blue lights and tried to stop the Mercedes on Bethnal Green Road soon after 3.45am.

The Mercedes then collided with an oncoming Vauxhall Corsa.

A woman in it, who was in her 30s but has not been named, died at the scene.

Last year the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which will be investigating this latest incident, gave warning that there were too many fatal pursuits and recommended that police should give chase only when a serious crime had been committed.

Statistics released last month showed that 148 people have died since 2002 in collisions involving police cars. In the past year alone 30 people were killed.

A spokeswoman for the London Ambulance Service said that a man in the Corsa had suffered serious head injuries and was in a “life-threatening” condition. The two-year-old girl was admitted “as a precaution”.

The third patient, a 45-year-old woman, was in a stable condition but had suffered “very serious injuries including a very serious leg injury”.

A man aged 45 was taken to the hospital with “minor injuries” consisting of lower-back pain.

The authorities would not say how each person was involved in the accident.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: “The unmarked police car put on blue lights to alert the Mercedes to stop.

“At this stage the Mercedes drove away at speed and was in collision with another vehicle, a blue Vauxhall Corsa. The occupants of the black Mercedes decamped from the scene.”

He said that all next of kin had yet to be informed and that no formal identification of the woman had taken place, adding that a post-mortem examination would be arranged in due course.

Scotland Yard’s Department of Professional Standards, following the usual procedure, has launched an investigation.

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