Numerous victims in the Munich shooting were young people, possibly lured to the location by a message posted online promising free food at the McDonalds where the shooting took place.
Advertisement
He said there were indications the killer had been bullied “by others his age”.
The posting had been sent from a young woman’s account.
Some reports have identified the gunman as David Ali Sonboly, but neighbours who lived in his apartment building said he was known to everyone as Ali.
“The investigation is still trying to determine where it came from”, Heimberger said, adding that the assailant was not the registered owner of the gun.
As to Sonboly’s state of mind, a spokesman for the Munich prosecutors’ office told the news conference that the gunman had spent two months as an inpatient at a mental care facility in 2015 and was afterwards treated as an outpatient.
He said police were working on the assumption the attacker wanted to mark the fifth anniversary of another mass shooting in Norway, when right-wing extremist Anders Breivik killed 77 people.
However, he appears to have planned the assault with chilling precision, with Bavarian police chief Robert Heimberger saying on Sunday that Sonboly had visited the site and taken photos during a year of preparation. The 16-year-old was interviewed based on his relationship with the suspect and gave conflicting statements, Munich police said.
Andrae of the Munich police said the teenager had been obsessed with books and articles about mass killings “linked to maniacs”.
Its serial numbers were filed off and David S. had no permit to purchase weapons, authorities have said. It was a pistol that had been rendered unusable and sold as a prop, then was restored to a fully functioning state.
Six years earlier, another teenager, 17-year-old Tim Kretschmer, had stormed the educational institute armed with his father’s gun and shot dead nine students and three teachers before moving to a nearby auto dealership where he killed another two people.
It was the second attack targeting victims apparently at random in less than a week in Bavaria.
“I will never forget the last words that he told me”, said Bayri, shaking his head.
But none of them were among the victims of the shooting.
“I tried to put my hands on his wounds so he wouldn’t bleed to death”, Bayri said.
Shopper Hueseyin Bayri told The Associated Press the troubled teen cursed foreigners and bellowed “I’m German!” and “I will kill you all” as he pulled the trigger. “He usually looks at me and says hello”, she said.
“Why can one person do something like this?”
On Sunday, authorities raised the number of injured people from two dozen to 35.
Advertisement
“Some of the kids who died happened to be my son’s friends”, she said.
