crime
Police shot the child – investigation continues
While searching for a missing child, the police suddenly used weapons and a twelve year old child was seriously injured. Investigations are now underway to find out how the operation could have escalated to such an extent.
The investigation continues following an escalated police operation in Bochum in which a twelve-year-old child suffered life-threatening injuries. According to officials, the girl approached police officers with two knives during an operation in an apartment. Police then shot the children, one with a Taser and the other with a service weapon, police and prosecutors said.
Doctors were still fighting to save the 12-year-old’s life in the operating room hours later. They later described the girl’s condition as “critical but stable.”
Many details about how operations will proceed remain unclear. The twelve year old actually lived in a housing group in Münster. But suddenly there was no trace of him there on Sunday. The caregivers immediately raised the alarm and called the police as the girl was dependent on essential medicines. On Monday evening there were indications that the twelve-year-old may have gone to see his mother in Bochum.
Police officers feel threatened
In the middle of the night around 01.30, the mother opened the apartment door for the police. Then, according to police, events took over. Based on previous investigations, police and prosecutors assume that the girl approached police officers with two knives in her hands when officers arrived.
They felt threatened and took out their weapons. One officer used his electrical impulse device – a weapon that temporarily incapacitates a person affected by an electric shock, but does not cause life-threatening injuries. The other grabbed his service weapon and fired one or more shots – critically wounding the girl.
The daughter and mother are deaf
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This operation could be very difficult because, according to the police, both the twelve-year-old child and his mother were deaf. A police spokesman said whether and how communication could be established between emergency services and the two deaf people – for example with the help of short messages on pieces of paper – was the subject of an investigation.
dpa
