Hanau perpetrators not right-wing extremist? BKA boss speaks up personally

The nine people a 43-year-old killed in Hanau all had foreign roots. Nevertheless, it is evidently controversial in the BKA whether the offender acted out of racism.

• In Hanau in Hesse, there was a bloody attack with eleven deaths in February.
• The investigators initially assumed a right-wing motivated attack.
• The BKA no longer sees racism as the main motive for action.

Update of March 31: The Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) still assumes that the Hanau attack was racially motivated . "The BKA assesses the act as clearly right-wing extremist," BKA President Holger Münch said on Twitter on Tuesday. "The crime was based on racist motives." Nord- und Westdeutscher Rundfunk and Süddeutsche Zeitung had previously reported that an investigation by the investigators into the perpetrator stated that the perpetrator was not primarily driven by an extreme right-wing attitude (see below).

# BKA President Holger Münch on the latest media coverage in connection with #Hanau: pic.twitter.com/7H02cW11Ju

Münch now said that there was no final report on the fact. The investigation continued. However, the report also mentioned that the investigators were working on the final report and formulated a controversial thesis.

Hanau attack: was racism the motive? Investigators have new thesis on the perpetrator's worldview

First report: Karlsruhe - Investigators of the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) do not classify the Hanau attack according to a media report as an act by a right-wing extremist . Tobias R. chose his victims to get as much attention as possible for his conspiracy myth of being monitored by a secret service . According to the investigators, he did not go through a typical extreme right-wing radicalization , reported WDR, NDR and Süddeutsche Zeitung . A spokesman for the federal prosecutor's office in Karlsruhe did not want to comment on Monday. The police investigation was still ongoing.

Hanau attack: Nine people with foreign roots died

Tobias R. had moved through Hanau, Hesse , late in the evening on February 19, and shot nine people with foreign roots . The 43-year-old and his mother were later found dead in their apartment. R. had spread confused thoughts and abstruse conspiracy theories as well as racist views on the Internet.

A scene from the scene of the Hanau attack

© dpa / Boris Roessler

Attorney General Peter Frank had taken over the investigation that night. From the beginning it had been said that there was "serious evidence for a racist background of the deed".

The perpetrator of Hanau is said to be a conspiracy theorist: Did he suffer from paranoia in front of secret services?

The Federal Criminal Police Office has commissioned the BKA to carry out further investigations. According to the media, the assessment of R. should flow into a final report that is currently being worked on.

According to the investigators, racism was not the dominant aspect in R.'s worldview, it said. This had increased above all in conspiracy myths about secret services and suffered from paranoia . R. did not notice neighbors and acquaintances through racist statements. There were also no indications that he had dealt with right-wing ideology or with right-wing terrorists and their actions.

After the Hanau attack, the problem of xenophobia increased in the priorities of the federal government - Interior Minister Horst Seehofer announces a commission. Hanau's act of blood causes dismay in Germany. However, expert Hajo Funke is “not really surprised”. In the interview, he gives the background to the case.

More on the topic in the video: Residents film the crime scene with a cell phone

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* Merkur.de is part of the nationwide Ippen-Digital editors network.