Magdeburg (dpa) – In the attack on the Christmas market in Magdeburg with five dead and 200 injured, the suspected perpetrator is said to have entered the Christmas market via an escape and rescue route. The journey took around three minutes until the arrest, said Tom-Oliver Langhans, the director of the Magdeburg police station. According to authorities, four adults and a nine-year-old child were killed. There are a total of 205 victims, including 5 dead.
It is therefore a case of a lone perpetrator. According to the current status of the investigation, a second perpetrator can be ruled out, said a police spokesman in Magdeburg. According to information from the city, the victims were taken to 15 clinics, including in Brandenburg.
The Magdeburg public prosecutor's office is currently investigating the suspect for five counts of murder. As senior public prosecutor Horst Walter Nopens said, the charge is also attempted murder in 200 cases in conjunction with dangerous bodily harm. The suspect is in police custody.
The death driver's motive may have been dissatisfaction with the treatment of refugees from Saudi Arabia Germany. This is the current status of the investigation, said Nopens.
In Magdeburg, a car drove into the crowd at a Christmas market on Friday evening. Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) spoke on site of a “terrible, insane act”. The suspect arrested that evening was Taleb A., a doctor from Bernburg who comes from Saudi Arabia.
According to information from the German Press Agency, the 50-year-old, who has lived in Germany since 2006, describes himself as an ex-Muslim. According to dpa information, A. applied for asylum in February 2016, which was decided on in July of the same year. At that time, the Saudi citizen received asylum as a politically persecuted person.
Taleb A. was caught at the scene by emergency services and arrested.
