Baden-Württemberg: Knife assault deliberate at synagogue – police arrest 18-year-old | EUROtoday

Status: 12:44 p.m. | Reading time: 2 minutes

WAn 18-year-old man from Weinheim in Baden-Württemberg has been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit homicide. He is alleged to have mentioned a knife assault on guests to a synagogue in Heidelberg with one other man, the Stuttgart and Karlsruhe public prosecutors and the State Criminal Police Office introduced on Friday.

“The intended goal was to kill one or more visitors during the attack on the synagogue, followed by a martyr's death, in which both people wanted to be shot by the police,” the authorities stated. The younger man is an 18-year-old German-Turk.

The background is a police operation in Bad Friedrichshall on May third. The condo of a 24-year-old was searched that day on suspicion of making ready a critical act of violence endangering the state. According to the police, the 24-year-old immediately took a number of kitchen knives throughout the search and fled out of a window into the open air. The officers arrested him there.

Instead of placing down the knives, he intentionally threw a knife at an officer and ran in the direction of him. The officer shot the person. The man is already in custody. He can be accused of tried manslaughter and a very critical case of bodily assault on emergency personnel.

When the proof was evaluated, a connection was made to the 18-year-old man from Weinheim, with whom the 24-year-old is alleged to have mentioned a doable knife assault on guests to a synagogue in Heidelberg in April 2024, in response to investigators.

The 18-year-old's condo was searched on May 18, the person was arrested and is now in custody. There had been no indications that guests to the synagogue had been in imminent hazard.