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Teen Gunman Surrenders At German School

Student Hostages Go Free; Teen Had Demanded Money, Getaway Car

Friday, October 18, 2002
(4:47 PM ET)
The Associated Press

WAIBLINGEN, Germany
After a six-hour standoff, a teenage gunman who took four youngsters hostage at a school in southeastern Germany has put down his weapon and surrendered.

The gunman, believed to be between the ages of 16 and 18, had released his four hostages earlier in Waiblingen, Germany, which is near Stuttgart.

A SWAT team had surrounded the school, and authorities were communicating by cellular phone with the student, who had demanded a large sum of money and a getaway car. The teen was holding four students, believed to be 12 years old, in a second-floor computer lab. The fifth hostage, a teacher, either escaped or was released hours earlier.

Germany passed tighter gun laws after a school attack in April in the eastern German city of Erfurt, where a 19-year-old former student killed 16 people before committing suicide.
(TheKCRAChannel.com News Source)
2002 © The Associated Press.

Dan