SerpApi.Org
A gunman suspected of fatally shooting six child welfare workers at a shelter for mothers in Germany has killed himself in prison.
The suspect, identified as Fatih Khan G, was found dead by jail staff in his single cell on Tuesday, officials said.
There were no indications of third-party involvement in the 45-year-old’s death, the Lower Saxony state justice ministry said.
Four women and two men were killed in the shooting in the northern city of Stade on June 29. The shooting was considered one of the worst such crimes to have been committed in recent German history.
Police said the shooter was motivated by a custody dispute over his three-month-old daughter.
Khan G had arrived at the centre on June 29 for an appointment to discuss future care arrangements for his daughter when he pulled out a gun and opened fire on youth centre workers, authorities said.
His daughter and her 34-year-old mother were at the centre when the attack occurred, but neither was killed nor injured in the shooting. A seventh person was wounded but survived.
All six victims were workers at the youth centre, police said. They added that the attack had no political motive and was an “extremely cold-blooded” act of violence linked to a family dispute.
Khan G did not own a gun permit and was reported to have bought a pistol for the massacre for €4,000 (£3,500) in Berlin.
It has also emerged that he was subject to an arrest warrant in Turkey for unrelated offences and did not hold a German residence permit, though he was born in Germany.
While the suspect was previously known to police, he had not been considered violent. However, Der Spiegel reported that the suspect had been accused of shaking his daughter.
Doctors found injuries on the child at the time that were consistent with shaking, the German outlet reported.
The suspect allegedly then made threats against doctors at the medical centre where the girl had been treated, triggering a police investigation that was later dropped.
After the shooting, he tried to flee in a car driven by a 65-year-old woman, described by police as having “a close connection to the gunman’s family”, but was captured after a short chase.
Police officers opened fire on the car, but neither the gunman nor the driver was hurt.
Video footage showed the moment when the car was stopped and the pair were arrested.
The officers are seen kicking the car door before one person gets out and is handcuffed on the ground. The same footage shows another person lying on the ground in handcuffs by the passenger side of the car.
Immediately after the shooting, Kathrin Schuol, the police chief for Lüneburg, said: “The perpetrator had an appointment today, along with many of the victims, to discuss future custody arrangements for his three-month-old daughter.”
Mass shootings are relatively rare in Germany, particularly in comparison with the US, and it has some of the strictest gun laws worldwide.
Applicants for a gun permit need to show they have a clear need for one, such as competitive sports shooting, and must then pass a background check, a psychological evaluation and safety training.
The country has suffered three major mass shootings in recent years. In 2016, an 18-year-old German-Iranian man who was obsessed with violent video games killed nine people in Munich.
In February 2020, a far-Right extremist shot dead ten people and wounded five others in Hanau, a central German city.
In 2023, six people were shot dead in Hamburg by a gunman at a Jehovah’s Witness worship hall before he turned the gun on himself.
