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CRIME

Police kill fleeing drug dealer with bad shot

UPDATE: A policeman who shot a fleeing man wanted on drug charges in the back of the head has been suspended pending a manslaughter investigation. The officer claimed he had aimed for his legs.

Published: 28 July 2014 15:27 CEST
Police kill fleeing drug dealer with bad shot
Photo: DPA

A 33-year-old man died early on Friday evening as police tried to arrest him in Burghausen, eastern Bavaria.

A plainclothes policeman said he had fired a warning shot in the backyard of the residential block before shooting at the man in an attempt to stop him escaping. 

The suspect died immediately at the scene with a bullet to the back of his head, but the officer later said he meant to shoot him in the legs.

An autopsy was carried out on the body in Munich over the weekend.

The Bavarian Office for Criminal Investigation (LKA) has taken over the case and charged the officer with manslaughter through negligence, police said in a statement on Monday.

Investigators are currently interviewing witnesses and fellow officers who saw the incident unfold.

The 33-year-old was wanted for drug offences. A warrant for his arrest was issued several months ago.

It is not clear whether he had been armed or had threatened the officer. 

Around 50 people joined a protest on Saturday in Burghausen against "police violence" after the killing.

SEE ALSO: Robber fails because he can't speak German 

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CRIME

Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

A 17-year-old has turned himself in to police in Germany after an attack on a lawmaker that the country's leaders decried as a threat to democracy.

Published: 5 May 2024 12:52 CEST
Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

The teenager reported to police in the eastern city of Dresden early Sunday morning and said he was “the perpetrator who had knocked down the SPD politician”, police said in a statement.

Matthias Ecke, 41, European parliament lawmaker for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD), was set upon by four attackers as he put up EU election posters in Dresden on Friday night, according to police.

Ecke was “seriously injured” and required an operation after the attack, his party said.

Scholz on Saturday condemned the attack as a threat to democracy.

“We must never accept such acts of violence,” he said.

Ecke, who is head of the SPD’s European election list in the Saxony region, was just the latest political target to be attacked in Germany.

Police said a 28-year-old man putting up posters for the Greens had been “punched” and “kicked” earlier in the evening on the same Dresden street.

Last week two Greens deputies were abused while campaigning in Essen in western Germany and another was surrounded by dozens of demonstrators in her car in the east of the country.

According to provisional police figures, 2,790 crimes were committed against politicians in Germany in 2023, up from 1,806 the previous year, but less than the 2,840 recorded in 2021, when legislative elections took place.

A group of activists against the far right has called for demonstrations against the attack on Ecke in Dresden and Berlin on Sunday, Der Spiegel magazine said.

According to the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser is planning to call a special conference with Germany’s regional interior ministers next week to address violence against politicians.

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