Vineyards - Police feel threatened: officer shoots man
A police officer has shot a suspected attacker in Weingarten in the district of Ravensburg. The 26-year-old man was taken to hospital injured on Wednesday evening and underwent surgery there during the night, as the State Criminal Police Office (LKA) in Stuttgart and the public prosecutor's office in Ravensburg announced on Thursday. The injury was not life-threatening. The man, who has many previous convictions, was arrested. A decision on the arrest warrant is expected to be made on Thursday evening.
As things stand at present, the police were called shortly after 10 p.m. on Wednesday because of an argument between the 26-year-old man and a 17-year-old acquaintance. When two police officers tried to clear up the situation, the man, who was presumably drunk, suddenly pulled out a knife and turned it on the teenager and the two police officers.
Because the 26-year-old did not put down the knife despite the police officers' requests, but continued to approach them, a police officer finally fired a warning shot, it is said. Unimpressed by this, the German is said to have continued walking towards the two retreating police officers with the knife in his hand.
One of the police officers then fired his firearm twice in the direction of the 26-year-old. He was injured by a shot to the arm. Another shot missed him and hit the window of a café. No one was there at the time, according to the authorities.
It is the second case within a few days in which officers in the south-west have fired in a threatening situation. One day before Christmas Eve, a 49-year-old man had alerted the police - and said that there was a dead person in his apartment. When the officers arrived, the man was allegedly standing in front of the house armed with a knife and threatening the police officers.
Despite requests, he did not put the weapon down. "When the 49-year-old finally approached the police officers with the knife in his hand, one of the police officers deployed made use of his service weapon," it said. According to dpa information, the officer is said to have fired four shots. According to preliminary autopsy results from Heidelberg Forensic Medicine, the man died as a result of the shots. According to the LKA, the final result is still pending. Witnesses can still send videos of the incident via a tip portal.
It was reported that the emergency services had not discovered a body in the apartment. The police had already had dealings with the man on several occasions. According to the "Initiative 2. Mai", the 49-year-old was mentally ill and lived with his mother and three children.
The initiative is named after an incident on May 2, 2022, in which a mentally ill man died as a result of a police operation in the center of Mannheim. The trial against two officers involved for assault in the line of duty resulting in death and negligent homicide by omission is scheduled to begin on January 12.
Service weapons may only be used as a last resort. Whether so-called direct coercion is used is always decided by the police officer in question on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the principle of proportionality.
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- The investigation into the incident in Weingarten is being handled by the public prosecutor's office in Ravensburg and the LKA in Baden-Württemberg's state capital Stuttgart.
- The 26-year-old man involved in the incident has a history of criminality, with multiple previous convictions.
- The police in Baden-Württemberg, including those in Ravensburg and Stuttgart, have strict guidelines for using service weapons, which are only permitted as a last resort.
- The man who was shot in Weingarten was also involved in a similar incident near Ravensburg just a few days prior, where he reported a dead body but threatened police officers with a knife.
Source: www.stern.de
