The deadly knife attack on a regional train in Brokstedt, Schleswig-Holstein, and the way the authorities dealt with the alleged perpetrator have a parliamentary aftermath. The judiciary committee of the Hamburg Parliament will deal with the case in the coming week. The legal committee of the North Rhine-Westphalian state parliament is to meet in Düsseldorf for a special session. The motive of the suspect is still unclear.
Ibrahim A., a 33-year-old stateless Palestinian, had committed violent crimes in both NRW and Hamburg in the past. He was only released from custody in Hamburg a week before the bloody crime on the regional train.
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) had already raised questions in this regard on Thursday. It also needs to be clarified “why people who are so violent are still here in Germany,” she said during a visit to Brokstedt. Hamburg’s Senator for Justice Anna Gallina (Greens) has announced that she will report on the Hamburg aspects of the crime to the Judiciary Committee next Thursday.
The alleged perpetrator was relevantly known
The factions of the SPD and FDP in North Rhine-Westphalia emphasize in their application for a special session of the legal committee next Tuesday that A. should be “a multiple offender known to the judiciary” who in the past “has already become conspicuous to a considerable extent, especially in North Rhine-Westphalia target”. They expect the state government to provide “a comprehensive written report on the allegations and the criminal proceedings against the alleged perpetrator that have been recorded in North Rhine-Westphalia in the past”.
According to a listing by the German Press Agency, at least eleven investigations have been initiated against A. since he entered Germany in 2014, including physical harm, threats, theft and drug offences. He was convicted four times, three of which were final. Most recently, he had been in custody for a year because of a knife attack in Hamburg.
No further details were released about the suspect’s interrogation. According to Schleswig-Holstein’s Interior Minister Sabine Sütterlin-Waack (CDU), A. had not commented on Thursday, so that no conclusions could be drawn about his motive. As far as is known, this did not change on Friday either.
Defense rules out terrorist motive
The man’s defense lawyer ruled out a terrorist motive for his client. “I am sure that he has no political or religious or terrorist motive,” said lawyer Björn Seelbach of the German Press Agency. On the other hand, he thinks it is possible that the 33-year-old was angry and beside himself. He could also be mentally ill or have been under the influence of drugs.
Meanwhile, Schleswig-Holstein’s Minister of Education, Karin Prien, met with students and teachers from the commercial school in the city of Neumünster on Friday, who had also visited the two fatalities from the train, a 17-year-old and a 19-year-old. In doing so, she perceived “a general feeling of fear and insecurity,” said the CDU politician afterwards.
However, she was able to convince herself that there was a very good crisis intervention team at the school. According to Prien, the entire school community, the entire staff, is working on the crime together with the class in which the killed student was and the class of the boy who was killed. “But of course the other students are also affected by the fact that such a crime could have happened on a railway line that they use every day.” There is a lot to do.
A prayer for the victims was held in the church of the Evangelical Lutheran parish of Brokstedt, for which around 500 people gathered in and in front of the church, according to observers. Schleswig-Holstein’s Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Monika Heinold (Greens), Interior Minister Sabine Sütterlin-Waack (CDU) and Social Affairs Minister Aminata Touré (Greens) also came.
