An armed suspect who allegedly killed his mother before taking two hostages in Dresden has been shot dead, police said.
Officers said they were initially speaking to a 40-year-old German man after he barricaded himself in a shopping center with a nine-year-old boy and a 38-year-old shop worker.
Three hundred officers, including special forces, responded to the hostage situation, which ended shortly after noon on Saturday.
The man, who has not been identified, died during a confrontation with police.
“The 40-year-old man suffered fatal injuries during the attack and the release of the hostages. The specific circumstances are the subject of further investigations,” the state police in Saxony, of which Dresden is based, posted on Twitter. the capital
The man is suspected of killing his 62-year-old mother, who was found dead elsewhere in Dresden in the early hours of Saturday morning, before traveling into the city centre.
Around 8:30 a.m. local time, he entered a building on Ammonstrasse and fired at the door of a radio station.
He had the nine-year-old boy, believed to be a friend’s son, with him at the time, Saxony police said.
Radio Dresden staff reported that a gunman had entered the Ammonhof office building, where the station is located, and fired several shots.
The suspect then drove the boy to the Altmarkt-Galerie shopping center before taking the worker hostage and barricading them inside an office.
He then called the police, who confirmed they were in contact with him, with a negotiating team on site shortly after 11.30am.
The shopping center was evacuated and Dresden’s Striezelmarkt Christmas market was closed while the operation to free the hostages was carried out.
Image: The Striezelmarkt Christmas market was evacuated during the incident. Image: AP
The suspect was mentally ill
Police stormed the office after hearing gunshots during the standoff, forcing a door open to gain entry.
The hostages were “outwardly unharmed” during the ordeal, police said.
Police spokesman Thomas Geithner said the suspect was mentally ill, based on previous investigations.
Police separately confirmed that his 62-year-old mother had been found dead in an apartment building in the city’s Prohlis area on Saturday.
Security has focused on Germany in recent days, after investigators earlier this week foiled a far-right plot to overthrow the German government and install an aristocrat as the leader of a new state.