After knife attacks
GdP chief after attacks on police: debate about equipment
The Federal Chairman of the Police Union (GdP), Jochen Kopelke. Photo
© Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
The police are increasingly confronted with knife attacks, says a union representative. Officers need to be better protected. But what does that mean?
Following the fatal knife attack on a police officer in Mannheim and the fatal shooting after a knife attack in Wolmirstedt in Saxony-Anhalt, the police union is calling for a debate on the equipment of officers. “It’s not just about the taser, it’s also about protecting police officers from Knife attacks,” said the federal chairman of the police union, Jochen Kopelke, on MDR Aktuell.
Tasers are long-distance electric pulse devices; they are designed to enable police officers to keep an attacker at a distance. The police officer shoots arrows connected to wire from a distance of two to five meters. This is painful for the person affected.
“Knife is a special focus in everyday service”
Kopelke spoke of an increase in the number of knife attacks. “We see this in the crime statistics, which always look at the previous year. And we experience it in operations. The knife is a particular focus in everyday work.” The police are prepared and trained for when an opponent has a weapon. “The problem is, of course, that they are increasingly having situations in which they do not expect it and that is why the police are increasingly being called upon, even to the point of using firearms.”
Kopelke explained the use of service weapons: “Anyone who attacks others with a knife must expect that a pistol will be used, and that serious injuries will be the result.”
Most recently, a 27-year-old was shot dead by officers in Wolmirstedt, north of Magdeburg, on Friday evening after he allegedly stabbed a 23-year-old and then injured several people at a private European Championship garden party. The officers said they reached for their weapons after the Afghan tried to attack them with a knife.
On May 31, an Afghan man injured five members of the anti-Islam movement Pax Europa and an officer with a knife in Mannheim. The police officer later died.