A few days before the deadly knife attack in a regional train from Kiel to Hamburg, the alleged perpetrator was psychiatrically assessed – without any particular abnormalities being found.
As part of his almost one-year pre-trial detention for a violent crime, he was given psychiatric care in Hamburg’s Billwerder prison, the Hamburg judiciary announced on Thursday. The reason for the care had been assaults in which he had been involved twice during his detention.
“Shortly before the release, a psychiatrist found no harm to others or to himself,” said a spokeswoman for the authorities. Therefore, there were no reliable indications to apply for legal support or to turn on the social psychiatric service. “Unlike when an arrest warrant is revoked, there are no options to impose conditions or instructions when it is revoked.”
suspect in custody
After the fatal knife attack on a regional train in Schleswig-Holstein, the 33-year-old suspect was taken into custody on Thursday. The stateless Palestinian would be charged with two counts of treacherous murder and four counts of attempted manslaughtersaid a spokesman for the public prosecutor’s office responsible for the investigation in Itzehoe.
The alleged attacker sat in front of the crime because of another knife attack in Hamburg already a year in custody. He was on August 18, 2022 by the District Court of Hamburg-St. Georg was sentenced to one year and one week for dangerous bodily harm and theft, court spokesman Kai Wantzen said on Thursday.
According to the judgment, which is not final, the 33-year-old attacked and injured a man with a knife in front of a homeless shelter in Hamburg on January 18, 2022. Both had stood in line for food distribution and got into an argument. A. stated at the time that he had consumed large amounts of cocaine, heroin and alcohol before the crime.
The 33-year-old appealed the verdict. The district court had initially initiated follow-up investigations, and there were also scheduling difficulties with an expert. Therefore, a date for a new trial could not be set.
Because the duration of the detention threatened to exceed the sentence of the district court, the district court lifted the arrest warrant on January 19. Since only the convicted person had appealed the verdict, the district court should not have pronounced a longer prison sentence, Wantzen explained.
The two young fatalities knew each other
After the knife attack on Wednesday, further information about the victims became known. A 17-year-old and a 19-year-old from the region died, as Schleswig-Holstein’s Interior Minister Sabine Sütterlin-Waack (CDU) said in a special session of the state parliament on Thursday. “They knew each other.”
The minister had previously given the girl’s age as 16. Sütterlin-Waack also updated the number of injuries. Accordingly, five people and the perpetrator himself were injured. Initially, seven were injured.
Two people suffered life-threatening injuries. Like a third victim, you are still in the hospital, said Sütterlin-Waack on Thursday in Kiel. Three people are still in the hospital, two of whom have been operated on, said Sütterlin-Waack. Two other travelers have already been released from the hospital.
The perpetrator himself was slightly injured. Sütterlin-Waack said he was at the immigration office in Kiel shortly before the crime on Wednesday and applied for a residence card. From there he was sent to the registration office.
A. probably came to Germany on Christmas Eve 2014 and was registered in North Rhine-Westphalia from January 2015 to the end of 2020, according to the Düsseldorf refugee ministry. According to dpa information, he was repeatedly conspicuous for various crimes during this time.
According to security circles, there were, among other things, proceedings for threats, bodily harm, property damage, shoplifting and sexual harassment. Several media had previously reported. According to “Bild”, the crimes took place between 2015 and 2020 in Euskirchen, Bonn, Bad Münstereifel and Cologne.
Witnesses held the attacker – Kubicki demands “broadside of the rule of law
In 2016, the alleged perpetrator is said to have received subsidiary protection. According to “Spiegel”, however, a withdrawal procedure for the protective title was initiated. A subsidiary protection status prevented his deportation.
On Wednesday afternoon, the police had received several emergency calls from passengers. Upon notification, the train was stopped, after which the events had shifted to the platform, a police spokeswoman said. According to the police, witnesses held the attacker. Accordingly, they managed to stop the suspect immediately after the crime until the emergency services arrived. About 120 passengers were on the train.
“How could it happen that he was no longer in a correctional facility with so many criminal records?” asked Faeser, who had come to Brokstedt with Schleswig-Holstein’s Prime Minister Daniel Günther (CDU). Now it has to be clarified how it could happen “that he was released from custody so early,” said Faeser, and “why people who are so violent are still here in Germany”.
According to the Itzehoe public prosecutor’s office, there is no evidence of a terrorist background to the crime. According to Sütterlin-Waack, the man’s interrogation has not yielded any results so far, so nothing can be said about his motives. She therefore warned against hasty political demands as a reaction to the terrible events.
Bundestag Vice President Wolfgang Kubicki said “Bild” that the “full broadside of the rule of law” was needed. “These actions must lead us to the question: What went wrong between 2014 and 2016?” Kubicki warned to keep an eye on “our country’s ability to integrate”. Germany cannot “take in an infinite number of people who we would then no longer be able to look after and integrate”. As a consequence of the fact, the police union (GdP) called for more police officers and security personnel, for example at train stations. (dpa, AFP, tsp)
Note: An earlier version of this article stated that the police released information about the ages of the victims. This was incorrect and has been corrected. We apologize for this error.