BERLIN (AP) – Gerguy’s government on Wednesday ordered a 30-year-old man accused of intentionally driving his car in other cars along a main road in Berlin and injuring six other people who were transferred to a psychiatric criminal while investigators continue to investigate the man’s case. Reasons.
Authorities said the Iraqi-born man was under the impression that he had carried out a planned attack Tuesday night motivated by Islamist ideology, but noted that he was suffering from mental health problems.
The suspect driving a black Opel Astra allegedly hit three motorcycles elsewhere in the Bundesautobahn 100, prosecutors and Berlin police said in a set. He then stopped on the road and placed an old ammunition box on the roof of his car, claiming it contained explosives, he said.
“Based on the current state of our investigation, we assume this is an Islamist motivational attack,” said Berlin Interior Sen. Andreas Geisel. “Religious origin cannot be excluded.”
Three other people were seriously injured in Tuesday night’s attack, and a motorcyclist was added with a life-threatening head and back injury, prosecutor Martin Steltner said. Collisions occurred shortly before 7 p.m. and caused the total closure of one of the main traffic arteries of the German capital.
After the driver’s arrest, the officers took many other people trapped on the closed road away from their cars. Police used a strong jet of water to open the box they had placed on the roof of the car, but only discovered equipment inside.
Investigators have revealed the man’s identity, as is standard in Germany, but local media have known the suspect as Sarmad D. He’s under investigation for three cases of attempted murder.
There were indications that the guy had intellectual aptitude problems, Geisel said.
“The fact that the suspect is possibly suffering from mental health problems does not facilitate this challenge,” Geisel said. “If non-public challenges are mixed with ideas laden with religion, they can lead to uncontrollable acts; yesterday’s occasions have shown in a very painful way how vulnerable our society is.
Investigators were investigating whether the suspect was related to an extremist organization or if others were concerned about his actions, but so far they have uncovered no evidence of that, according to Steltner.
However, they were looking for a recommendation that the guy might have had an imaginable contact with other extremists, Steltner added. His workplace later issued a statement that the suspect had been transferred to a closed psychiatric unit in a prison.
Tuesday’s violence comes more than 3 years after a Tunisian hit a stolen truck at a Berlin Christmas market, killing 12 people, an attack he later claimed through the Islamic State group.
Authorities said the suspect in detention first hit a car and then entered the motorcyclist who suffered fatal injuries. He allegedly hit a momentary user on a scooter and then used his car to push the biker in front of the car, prosecutor Steltner said.
Several gerguy media reported that the guy shouted “Allahu akbar” or “God is great” in Arabic, while they were taking him out of his car. The Bild newspaper reported that he also shouted, “No one is approaching, otherwise they will all die.”
Then the suspect unrolled a prayer rug and began to pray, the Tagesspiegel newspaper reported. Then a policeman approached the man, spoke to him in Arabic, pulled him out of the car and stopped him, according to the paper.
According to Gerguy’s media, the guy already knew him by the Berlin police.
Reports imply that he was born in Baghdad in 1990 and arrived in Germany as an asylum seeker, probably in 2016. His asylum application was rejected and his legal prestige only allowed him to stay in the country until the end of the year, the German news firm dpa reported.
In 2018, he was arrested for injuring others and taken to a psychiatric facility for a short time, Tagesspiegel reported.
After living for the first time in a refugee space in Berlin’s Altglienicke district, he moved to the Reinickendorf neighborhood, where he allegedly lived with his brother, Dpa said.
Dpa reported that the suspect allegedly referred to his plans on Facebook before the accidents. He posted photos of the car he was allegedly driving on motorcycles, as well as writings, the news firm reported.
Berlin Mayor Michael Mueller later said Wednesday that he surprised during the attack.
“I wish everyone who suffers from a speedy recovery and a lot of strength for this complicated moment,” Mueller said on Twitter.