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CRIME

Vienna sex offender suspect arrested in Czech Republic

Police have arrested a dangerous sex offender who’s suspected of raping at least two women.

Published: 21 December 2016 12:33 CET
Vienna sex offender suspect arrested in Czech Republic
A police photo of the suspect. Image: BPD Wien

The 35-year-old man, who is originally from Turkey, is believed to be responsible for two violent rapes in 2013 in Znojmo in the Czech Republic. He’s also suspected of physically assaulting a woman in Vienna in 2015, as well as an attempted rape earlier this year. Police are appealing for any further victims to come forward.

The man was arrested a few days ago in the Czech Republic and extradited to Vienna, where he’s a resident. He’s been charged with four criminal offences and is being held in pretrial custody.

“The two rapes took place in April and June 2013,” police spokesman Thomas Keiblinger said. In the first case, a 19-year-old woman was assaulted on a lawn in a public space. The second victim was only 18 at the time, and she was also strangled and beaten.

In 2015 he allegedly followed a 21-year-old woman home in the Ottakring district of Vienna, where he also lives. He physically attacked her but her neighbours heard her screaming and came to her help and he fled. In August he is accused of dragging a 26-year-old woman into a bush in Ottakring and attempting to rape her. Luckily a group of people who were passing by noticed what was happening and scared him off.

Police in Vienna were able to find traces of the suspect’s DNA and track him down. One of his victims also recognised him from a photo. The accused denies all the charges.

He is described as 1.70 meters tall and slender, but strong. Detectives say he changed his appearance several times since 2013, with different hairstyles and beard lengths.

Vienna police are asking anyone who may have been assaulted by the suspect to contact them on 01/31310-33 800.


 

TERRORISM

Austrian investigators seize devices at Munich shooter’s home

Investigators seized electronic devices at the home of a young Austrian who fired shots near Israel's Munich consulate, but found no weapons or Islamic State group propaganda material, authorities said Friday.

Published: 7 September 2024 09:02 CEST
Austrian investigators seize devices at Munich shooter's home

German police shot dead the 18-year-old man on Thursday when he fired a vintage rifle at them near the diplomatic building.

They said they were treating it as a “terrorist attack”, apparently timed to coincide with the anniversary of the killings of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games.

Authorities raided the gunman’s home in the Salzburg region, seizing electronic data carriers, Austria’s top security chief Franz Ruf told a press conference in Vienna on Friday.

READ ALSO: Munich Israeli consulate gunman was ‘Austrian national known to authorities’

During the raid, “no weapons or IS propaganda” material were found, Ruf added.

Despite being subject to a ban on owning and carrying weapons, the man managed to purchase a vintage carbine rifle fitted with a bayonet with around “fifty rounds of ammunition” for 400 euros ($445) the day before the attack, Ruf said.

He opened fire at around 9:00 am (0700 GMT) near the Israeli consulate, sparking a mobilisation of about 500 police in downtown Munich.

At a separate press conference in Munich, prosecutor Gabriele Tilmann said investigators were combing through the gunman’s electronic data but had yet to find conclusive evidence of his motive.

But the “working hypothesis” was that “the perpetrator acted out of Islamist or anti-Semitic motivation”, she told reporters.

Austrian police said on Thursday that the gunman, who had Bosnian roots, had previously been investigated on suspicion of links to terrorism.

Investigators last year found three videos he had recorded in 2021, showing scenes from a computer game “with Islamist content”, prosecutors said in a statement.

In one of them the suspect had used an avatar with a flag of the “al-Nusra Front”, a jihadist group active in Syria, said Ruf.

But the investigation was dropped in 2023 as there were no indications that he was active in “radical” circles, prosecutors said.

“The mere playing of a computer game or the re-enactment of violent Islamist scenes was not sufficient to prove intent to commit the offence,” they added.

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