German police were hunting for three gunmen who went on a shooting rampage in a Munich mall on Friday, killing eight people in what was described as a suspected terror attack.
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Police commandos carried out the raid early on Saturday on the apartment in the neighbourhood of Maxvorstadt where Bild said the gunman – identified by police as an 18-year-old German-Iranian – lived with his parents.
He then moved through a nearby shopping centre, firing at random, before eventually turning the gun on himself.
Police said the Wurzburg attacker appears to have been inspired by the Islamic State but they have not been able to establish any direct link to the extremist group.
Officials had earlier said they were considering all possible motives for the attack, but Munich police chief Hubertus Andrä said Saturday that there were no indications that the gunman had any connection with Islamic State following a search of his bedroom.
Munich police investigator Robert Heimberger says it appears that the shooter hacked a Facebook account and sent a message urging people to come to the mall for a free giveaway.
“The motive or explanation for this crime is completely unclear”, he told reporters, adding that the suspect had no criminal record.
Police had initially said that they were looking for up to three suspects in the attack.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, will convene a meeting with chief of staff Peter Altmaier and Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere and a host of intelligence officials today to review the incident.
The teenage gunman shouts back, saying: “I am German”, and “I was born here”.
“People were very confused, and they were running and they were screaming”, she said.
His body was found on a side street near the mall, about two-and-a-half hours after the assault.
A neighbour speaking to a local broadcaster reportedly described the gunman as “very, very nice”.
During the rampage, the shooter got into an argument with a witness and their profanity-filled conversation was captured on two camera phones and posted on social media.
“I was standing on the balcony smoking a cigarette”. He also said he had been hospitalized before shots rang out again.
Bavarian State premier Horst Seehofer said the killings in Munich and an axe attack by a 17-year-old asylum-seeker that injured five people in Wuerzburg – also in Bavaria – on Monday should not be allowed to undermine democratic freedoms. “All the people from outside came streaming into the store and I only saw one person on the ground who was so severely injured that he definitely didn’t survive”.
“I heard a scream at first: ‘You shitty … foreigners”. In one picture a person can be seen lying on the ground covered in blood outside the centre.
Seven of the victims were teenagers, police said.
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The entire transport network in Munich was suspended, and the city’s main railway station evacuated.
