Six shot dead at German youth welfare center in ‘family tragedy,’ police say

STADE, Germany (AFP) — A gunman killed six people on Monday in a German youth welfare center for mothers and their children in what police said was a likely “family tragedy,” before the male suspect and a female companion were arrested.

The deadly shooting spree sparked a major police operation in the northern city of Stade, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Hamburg.

The six people killed were all adults, among them one who succumbed to their injuries in the hospital, while another person was wounded and in stable condition, a police spokesman told AFP.

“A male principal offender and a female companion” were arrested, he said, while a separate police statement mentioned a third suspect being held.

The police spokesman told AFP that investigators believed “it is not a case of femicide, nor does it involve a political background or anything of that nature. Rather, it is an extended family tragedy.”

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N24 television cited witnesses as saying that police deployed to the building after an emergency call and spotted two suspects who attempted to flee in a car, leading police to open fire.

One eyewitness told the news site Focus Online that police shouted “stop where you are” at the man and woman attempting to flee, then fired some 10 to 15 rounds at the vehicle.

A separate amateur video clip published by Bild daily showed a police roadblock stopping a Mercedes passenger car with a blown-out back tire on a country road nearby.

Officers with guns are then seen shouting at the two occupants to get out and arresting them as they lie face down on the road.

The day of deadly drama led police to shut down the center of the city of 50,000 people on the Elbe River in the Lower Saxony state. Police helicopters circled the sky above.

The shootings took place near a daycare center and an elementary school, said city councilor Carsten Brokelmann, adding that no one there was hurt.

“We are relieved that our staff and the children at the daycare center and primary school are safe, and I would like to thank the police officers for their efforts in this chaotic situation,” he said in a statement.

“At the same time, our deepest sympathies go out to the victims of this terrible act and their families.”

Germany has some of Europe’s strictest gun laws — they require anyone under 25 to pass a psychiatric exam before applying for a gun license — and mass shootings are relatively rare.

But they occur from time to time, and Monday’s was among the deadliest in recent times.

In February 2020, a far-right extremist shot dead nine people and wounded five others in the central German city of Hanau.

In March 2023, a disgruntled former Jehovah’s Witness member shot dead six people from the group’s congregation in Hamburg, before turning the gun on himself.

And in May 2022, a 21-year-old gunman opened fire at a secondary school in northern Germany, wounding a female member of staff before being arrested.