Frankfurt:
Germany reacted with shock and outrage on Tuesday following a 20-year-old petrol station worker was shot dead by a consumer angry about becoming asked to place on a mask even though purchasing beer.
The killing on Saturday evening in the western town of Idar-Oberstein is believed to be the 1st in Germany linked to the government’s coronavirus guidelines.
The row began when the cashier, a student, told the consumer to place on a face mask, as essential in all German shops. After a short argument, the man left.
The suspect then returned about an hour and a half later, this time wearing a mask. But as he brought his six-pack of beer to the till, he took off the mask and a different discussion ensued.
“The perpetrator then pulled out a revolver and shot him straight in the head,” prosecutor Kai Fuhrmann told reporters on Monday.
The suspect, a 49-year-old German man, walked to a police station the following day to turn himself in. He was arrested and has confessed to the murder.
He told police he felt “cornered” by the coronavirus measures, which he perceived as an “ever-growing infringement on his rights” and he had seen “no other way out”, Fuhrmann mentioned.
Idar-Oberstein mayor Frank Fruehauf named it “an unfathomable, terrible act”, and residents have laid flowers and candles outdoors the petrol station.
The murder comes just days ahead of Germans head to the polls for a basic election on September 26 that will see Chancellor Angela Merkel bow out of politics following 16 years.
Katrin Goering-Eckardt, the parliamentary leader of the Green party, tweeted that she was “deeply shaken” by the killing, which she mentioned was “the cruel result of hatred”.
Agriculture Minister Julia Kloeckner from Merkel’s centre-appropriate CDU party, who hails from the area, mentioned the murder was “shocking”.
The Tagesspiegel newspaper mentioned far-appropriate chat groups on Telegram have been applauding the murder, with one user writing “Here we go!!!” even though other individuals posted thumbs-up emojis.
Germany has seen repeated protests from anti-mask demonstrators all through the pandemic, some of them attracting tens of thousands of men and women.
The Querdenker (Lateral Thinkers) movement has emerged as the loudest voice against the government’s coronavirus curbs and regulations. Its marches have drawn a wide mix of men and women, like vaccine sceptics, neo-Nazis and members of Germany’s far-appropriate AfD party.
(This story has not been edited by TheSpuzz employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)