A driver rams a car into crowd in Germany's Mannheim, leaving 2 dead and 11 injured

BERLIN — A driver rammed a car into a crowd Monday in the southwestern German city of Mannheim, and authorities said two people were killed and 11 others injured, five of them severely.

A 40-year-old German from the nearby state of Rhineland-Palatinate was detained and in a hospital after being injured, State Interior Minister Thomas Strobl of Baden-Württemberg, where Mannheim is based, told German news agency dpa.

He later told reporters in Mannheim that "as far as the specific motivation of the crime is concerned, we have no indication of an extremist or religious background at the moment. The motivation could rather be based in the person of the perpetrator himself.”

German police and prosecutors said Monday at a joint news conference that the driver intentionally rammed his car into people and is being investigated for murder and attempted murder.

They said the driver shot himself in the mouth when he was arrested and had to undergo medical treatment at a hospital. He could not yet be questioned.

While the driver did not seem to be ideologically motivated, prosecutors said that the man, whose identity was not revealed in line with German privacy rules, has several previous convictions.

He served a short prison sentence for assault more than 10 years ago, and was convicted for drunken driving. He had also been investigated for a hate speech offense on Facebook in 2018, for which he was fined, prosecutors said without giving further details.

Investigators are also looking into the possibility that the driver may suffer from psychological problems.

Cars have been used as deadly weapons in several acts of violence in recent months in Germany.

Police said earlier that “indications of a second perpetrator cannot be confirmed at this stage of the investigation.” They said there was no more danger to the public.

Police spokesperson Stefan Wilhelm said a driver drove into people on Paradeplatz, a pedestrian street downtown, around noon, when workers come for lunch breaks. Local media reported a carnival market was taking place, meaning more visitors than usual in Mannheim, with a population of 326,000.

Mannheim University Hospital said they were treating three people, two adults and a child, dpa reported. The other injured people were taken to different hospitals in the region.

Images from the scene showed parts of the downtown area cordoned off, with a heavy police presence. Officers gathered round a badly damaged black car.

Friedrich Merz, who likely will become Germany's next chancellor, wrote on X that “the incident — as well as the terrible acts of the past few months — is an urgent reminder that we must do everything we can to prevent such acts.” Outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz wrote on X that “we mourn with the families of the victims of a senseless act of violence."

Last month, a 2-year-old girl and her mother died two days after they were injured in a car-ramming attack on a union demonstration in Munich. A 24-year-old Afghan man who came to Germany as an asylum-seeker was arrested, and prosecutors said he appeared to have an Islamic extremist motive.

Last year, six people were killed and more than 200 injured when a car slammed into a Christmas market in the eastern city of Magdeburg. The suspect, who was arrested, is a 50-year-old doctor originally from Saudi Arabia who had expressed anti-Muslim views and support for the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative For Germany party.