Female Attorney, 41, Went on Rampage That Killed 3, Injured Others, German Authorities Say
Authorities say a 41-year-old lawyer and recreational shooter went on a rampage in Germany in which three people, including her estranged partner and their 5-year-old son, were killed and others were injured.
Witnesses reportedly said they saw the unidentified woman run from a fiery building yesterday, after shots and an explosion, into a nearby hospital in Loerrach. There, authorities said, she shot and killed a male nurse and wounded a police officer who happened to be at St. Elisabethen before responding officers shot and killed her, according to Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
Subsequently, the bodies of her partner and son were found in the building from which the lawyer had allegedly been running. The man had reportedly been shot but the child died of blunt force trauma, according to Reuters.
Reuters says a police spokesman in Lörrach called the shootings a crime of passion, and the Local, an English-language German news publication, reports that the woman is believed to have killed her ex-partner and their child before entering the hospital armed with a pistol and a knife. Its article relies on news agency reports.
Although there was no filed court case concerning child custody, “It is suspected that relationship problems sparked this,” said state prosecutor Dieter Inhofer of Lörrach. Authorities say the lawyer had a miscarriage at the hospital in 2004.
The explosion in the apartment building injured 15 others, the Local says. It also reports that the woman allegedly shot two people on the street before entering the hospital.
Sky News says the attorney’s law office was in the building at which the explosion occurred.
Over 100 rounds of ammunition reportedly were found at the hospital.
An ABAJournal.com post last week links to a number of recent domestic cases in which lawyers were either victims or, in one case, the alleged perpetrator:
Pillsbury Winthrop Tax Attorney May Have Been Victim of Domestic Murder-Suicide, Authorities Say
