It can do more than 200mph and was once owned by criminals.

Now, it is being used to chase them.

Police in the Czech Republic have added their livery to a Ferrari 458 Italia which used to be “criminal property”.

Featuring a highly-tuned 4.5-litre V8 engine, it will be used to pursue the “most aggressive drivers on Czech highways”, officers said.

It will also be deployed against illegal races which pass through different countries, of which there were about 30 a year before the coronavirus pandemic.

Such events feature vehicles similar to the Italian supercar with “extreme performance that normal patrol vehicles cannot fully compete with”, Czech Police explained.

It has covered only 2,000km (1,242 miles) and will be used by the Czech Republic’s Special Surveillance Department.

Officers will be given extra training before driving it.

It has turned out to be a bargain. Modifying it cost less than a new Skoda Scala, police said.

The Ferrari is neither the rarest nor the most valuable car police in the Czech Republic have seized.

In the last year, they have held almost 900 vehicles, the vast majority of which were sold.

Assets worth almost £241m were seized in 2021.

“The proceeds are used to cover the damage caused by the offender,” police said.

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