What is behind the knife attack? Shortly after the act of a refugee, speculation began to sprout. Months later it turns out: The suspect was probably mentally ill in the act.
Würzburg – According to a psychiatric assessment, the Würzburg knife stabber was guilty of his attack on passers-by at the end of June.
The two experts commissioned in the investigation would each come to this conclusion independently of one another, the Bavarian State Criminal Police Office and the Munich Public Prosecutor’s Office announced on Friday in Munich.
However, it is still unclear what exactly drove the Somali to the attack on people who were obviously unknown to him. Fears shortly after the fact that the refugee acted for terrorist reasons or religious beliefs have not yet been confirmed. There are still no indications of confidants or accomplices or an extremist background, the investigators said on Friday. According to a toxicological report, the Somali had not taken drugs or alcohol.
With the recent expert opinion, there is now much to suggest that there will be a so-called security procedure against the 32-year-old – probably before the Würzburg district court. Such proceedings involve placing a suspect in a psychiatric ward. The public prosecutor’s office does not write an indictment for this, as in normal criminal proceedings, but an application: the Munich public prosecutor’s office wants to apply for permanent placement in a closed department of a psychiatric hospital by the end of the year, the investigators said on Friday.
In this procedure, the accused remains the accused and does not become the accused. Nevertheless, there is a hearing in court – in this case probably before a jury chamber.
The investigators emphasized on Friday that the assessment as incompetent did not mean that there were doubts about the man’s culpability or that he was innocent. He had been questioned on September 30th and had described the course of the crime in detail. The investigators initially did not provide any further information on the statements.
It has been proven that the migrant stabbed people who were obviously unknown to him on June 25th in Würzburg. Three women died and five people were critically injured. There were also four slightly injured. The investigators had already announced on July 20, based on an initial psychiatric report, that the man was possibly incapable of guilt at the time of the crime.
The accused has been in a psychiatric hospital for months. “He is now making a good impression, is mentally stable,” said his lawyer Hanjo Schrepfer of the German Press Agency. “He’s well adjusted with medication.” In his interrogation a few weeks ago, he regretted the knife attack.
Witnesses claim to have heard the exclamation “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”) twice during the knife attack. Jihadists and Salafists often use the term like a battle cry. In doing so, the extremists are hijacking the central religious formula of Islam, which has been used by Muslims around the world for centuries.
In addition, the refugee, who was later stopped with a police shot in the hospital, is said to have given a reference to jihad – that is, the “holy war”. Therefore, the investigators so far considered it obvious that the man could have been Islamistically motivated. The motive is still unknown. So far there is no evidence that the Somali was involved in a terrorist organization.
Initially, the investigators assumed that the suspect is 24 years old because he had given 1997 as the year of birth when he entered Germany. During a medical examination in mid-July, according to the investigators, he then spoke of 1989 as the year of birth.
The Somali was first registered in Germany in 2015. Since then, he had attracted attention several times because of mental health problems. Before the act, the authorities said they had no evidence that the man could endanger other people. Before the attack, the perpetrator lived in a homeless shelter in Würzburg. dpa
