Man dies after driver deliberately ploughs his car into crowds of Saturday shoppers
AN ELDERLY man has died after a driver ploughed his car into a crowd of shoppers outside a bakery in the southwestern German town of Heidelberg.
Suspect shot by police after Heidelberg attack
Two other people - a 32-year-old Austrian man and a 29-year-old Bosnian woman - were also hurt in the attack but were discharged from hospital after receiving treatment for minor injuries.
Police said the victim was a 73-year-old Germanman who suffered serious injuries when he was struck by the car and later died in hospital despite efforts to save him.
Police surround a suspect after his car rammed pedestrians in Heidelberg, Germany
The driver was seen getting out of the car with a knife and was later tracked down to near a swimming pool where he was shot and seriously injured by police after a brief stand-off.
He is now in a hospital in Heidelberg. Regional newspaper Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung said he was not fit to be questioned.
Investigations by the public prosecutors' office in Heidelberg and the town's criminal police are continuing.
But initial inquries appear to rule out a terrorist attack.
Police at the scene of an attack in Heidelberg, Gemany
Police spokesman David Faulhaber said he could not comment on the possible motives for the attack.
But he added: "There are no indications of a terrorist background.”
Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung cited police as saying the suspect was a young German man.
Police seal off the scene of the Heidelberg attack
The newspaper said the suspect had stopped at a red traffic light and when it turned green put his foot down before hitting the group of people at high speed and smashing into a pillar.
The German authorities are on high alert after a failed Tunisian asylum-seeker drove a truck into a Christmas market in Berlin on December 19, killing 12 people.