Teenager hacked into a Facebook account to lure children to McDonald’s before the rampage
An 18-year-old Munich teenager who shot dead nine people and wounded 27 more was “obsessed” with mass shootings from around the world, reports the German media. He had also likely hacked a Facebook account and posed as a young woman to lure young victims to the McDonald’s outlet where he began the masscare, the German interior minister said.
Police said the 18-year-old gunman, who opened fire at in and around the Olympia Einkaufzentrum (OEZ) shopping centre and McDonald’s restaurant on Friday evening, had been raised in Munich and was still in full-time education.
They added that he had likely been in psychiatric care and there were indicators he had been treated for depression.
Robert Heimberger, the head of Bavaria’s criminal police, said it appeared the German-Iranian shooter, who has been identified in multiple media accounts as Ali David Sonboly, had hacked a girl’s Facebook account to “invite (the victims) to go to the branch, offering them special reductions.”
The Facebook post, according to German media reports, read: “Come today to the Maccy’s at 16 o’clock at OEZ I’ll buy you something but nothing too expensive”.
Heimberger said: “It appears it was prepared by the suspect and then sent out.”
It is assumed that Sonboly launched his killing spree in the Bavarian city in an apparent revenge attack for being bullied. He targeted youngsters of “Turkish and Arab” origin, having claimed those groups had picked on him in school.
Classmates of Sonboly told the Guardian he had been bullied at school, while neighbours described him as shy and lazy. “At school, Ali was often bullied by others and really unpopular,” one classmate said. “He was a bit chubby, and he was either by himself or together with one or two people, but he seemed to have hardly any friends.
“Yesterday at noon, I came home and I saw Ali here in the entrance of our building, he was still delivering newspapers the day of the shooting. It was strange though because he usually at least says hi to me because I do know him, but when I greeted him, he didn’t say a word to me and seemed strange and withdrawn.”
Despite being born and raised in a relatively affluent district of Munich, Sonboly was apparently insecure about his nationality.
Sonboly killed nine people and injured 16 others at the Olympia mall in Munich. He escaped from the shopping centre and then committed suicide, with his body found later Friday night a kilometre (0.6 miles) from the scene of the massacre.
Most of the victims in Friday’s attack were foreigners, including three Turkish nationals, three people from Kosovo and a Greek man. The casualties were mostly young, with three aged just 14 and two aged 15.
