A cashier advises a customer of the mask requirement. Then he is said to have fetched a gun and shot the man. The suspect confesses – and comments on his horrific motive.
Idar-Oberstein – After a fatal attack on a gas station cashier in a dispute over wearing a corona mask, the investigations against the 49-year-old suspect continue.
According to Chief Public Prosecutor Kai Fuhrmann, the man has not yet appeared in the police force. He is said to have shot the 20-year-old seller in Idar-Oberstein (Rhineland-Palatinate) in the head on Saturday evening after he had warned him twice about the mask requirement when buying beer.
Perpetrators reject corona measures
The German confessed to the fact. The alleged perpetrator testified that he rejects the corona measures. As for the motive, he stated that the situation of the corona pandemic was a heavy burden on him, said Fuhrmann. He felt pushed into a corner and “saw no other way out” than to set an example. The victim seemed to him “responsible for the overall situation, since it had enforced the rules,” said Fuhrmann.
The alleged murder weapon, other weapons and ammunition were found and secured by the police during a house search of the suspect, said Fuhrmann. The man does not have a gun license – the origin of the guns still needs to be clarified. He lives in Idar-Oberstein.
Urgent suspicion of murder
Fuhrmann initially did not want to provide any further personal information. There was still an investigation going on, he said. The arrest warrant was issued on an urgent suspicion of murder for low motives. The suspect is now on remand in a detention center.
According to the previous investigations, the 49-year-old had entered the sales room of the gas station without a mask on Saturday evening and placed two six-packs of beer on the counter at the cash register. He later said he forgot the mask. The cashier pointed out the mask requirement to the man – whereupon the man left the room after the investigation and raised his hand threateningly.
“Targeted from the front in the head” shot
The 49-year-old was annoyed by the rejection, it said on Monday. He then put a revolver in his pocket and drove to the gas station again to provoke the 20-year-old salesman, Fuhrmann reported from the suspect’s admission.
This time he wore a mouth and nose cover, took another six-pack of beer and went to the checkout. “There he took off the mouth and nose cover,” said Fuhrmann. The cashier had again advised the man to comply with the mask requirement: The perpetrator then pulled the gun and shot the 20-year-old. Fuhrmann said the suspect shot the victim “specifically in the head from the front”.
The suspect was arrested on Sunday morning on the premises of the police in Idar-Oberstein. “We assume that he wanted to surrender,” said Trier’s police chief Friedel Durben. “This is definitely a special case: We did not have such an act in either the Trier police headquarters or in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate that suggests a connection to Corona.”
Flowers and wreaths laid at the gas station
The horror in Idar-Oberstein is great. “That is a very unbelievable, terrible act that happened here in Idar-Oberstein,” said Mayor Frank Frühauf (CDU). This can also be seen in the great concern of the local citizens. Many would have laid flowers and wreaths at the gas station. “You can’t compare such an act with anything. It will take a while to process that, ”he said.
There were also dismayed reactions from politics. The Green Bundestag member Renate Künast wrote on Monday evening on Twitter: “I am appalled by the gruesome murder in # Rhineland-Palatinate. My thoughts are with the relatives. #Masking as a motive for murder leaves me speechless, “wrote the politician. “#Hate online is real and words can turn into terrible deeds. Fighting that is our duty. ”“ Mask requirement ”was at the top of the Twitter trends in the evening, with many users writing about the topic.
According to a statement, the federal chairwoman of the Left, Susanne Hennig-Wellsow, said: “We owe the clarification first and foremost to the victim and his family. But it is of elementary importance for all of us. ”Among other things, it must be determined where and why the man had a gun, whether he acted alone or“ was in some chats spreading ideas about overthrow ”. dpa
