A man is said to have killed his father and hit four cyclists with a car while trying to escape. A 71-year-old cyclist was fatally injured in the incident in Mannheim, the other three were hospitalized with serious injuries, the police and prosecutors said on Sunday evening.
The 36-year-old suspect, who has since been arrested, is suspected of having killed his 69-year-old father in Ellerstadt in Rhineland-Palatinate shortly after 6 p.m. on Sunday. The background of the act initially remained in the dark. According to preliminary investigations, the alleged perpetrator then fled by car before the police arrived. In Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, the car then collided with the four cyclists, and the driver fled again – ultimately on foot. Finally he jumped into the adjacent Rhine.
“The man, who was probably in a mental state of emergency, was finally arrested by police forces,” the investigators reported.
A police spokesman told the German Press Agency late in the evening that there was no evidence that the crimes could be politically motivated. It was initially unclear whether the suspect had previously been known to the police.
The exact circumstances of the arrest on the Rhine were still unclear hours later. According to the investigators, a helicopter and a boat from the water police were used in the chase.
The scene of the accident on Mannheim’s Rhenaniastrasse was cordoned off over a large area on Sunday evening.
