Duisburg
Attack in the gym: 21-year-old in acute danger of death
A police officer at the scene of the crime. photo
©Oliver Berg/dpa
Not far from Duisburg City Hall is a fitness studio that became the scene of a bloody attack. Four people came to the hospital. One of the victims is in acute mortal danger.
After the attack in a Duisburg gym on Tuesday evening, the youngest victim – a 21-year-old man – is in acute danger of death. The man had already been operated once, and a second operation is currently in the room, said investigating prosecutor Jill McCuller. The other three seriously injured, aged 24, 24 and 32, were still only able to be questioned to a very limited extent.
There are also no surveillance cameras in the gym. It is therefore difficult to reconstruct the exact processes. In any case, the investigators are not assuming that there was an amok act, but that one or more of the later victims had had an argument with the perpetrator, said the prosecutor. What it was about and how the conflict went on will be further investigated. The police had already questioned other athletes from the studio about the process on Tuesday evening.
Part of the investigation is also whether the perpetrator himself was a member of the studio, so should be known by name, said the prosecutor. The suspect is looking for a man in his 30s, of average build, with a long black beard. The police have opened an information portal online and are asking witnesses for information. According to the police, the murder weapon was a slashing or stabbing weapon, which is also being sought.