Oslo, Oct. 15, (dpa/GNA) – The man who killed five people in the town of Kongsberg in southern Norway has been placed in medical care, according to a report in Norwegian daily Verdens Gang on Friday.
The attacker’s lawyer had earlier said that his client was to be given a psychiatric examination due to doubts about his sanity. The Norwegian police also confirmed that the suspect was known to have frequently sought medical help prior to the attacks.
“The act seems like an act of terrorism, but we do not know the motives of the perpetrator,” the head of the Norwegian police security service, Hans Sverre Sjovold, said on Thursday.
The 37-year-old Dane has admitted to attacking several people with a bow and arrow, along with other weapons, on Wednesday night.
The new Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store and the minister of justice were expected in Kongsberg on Friday afternoon, where investigations into the exact sequence of events are continuing.
So far it has been established that police officers first encountered the perpetrator in a supermarket. The officers were shot at with arrows and were unable to get into a position from which they could return fire, according to a police spokesperson. While the officers went to get body armour, the offender managed to escape.
The attacker then ran through the city centre shooting at people before forcing his way into various apartments, where he also killed people. Police suspect that all five victims were killed after the man first encountered police.
Prosecutor Ann Iren Svane Mathiassen told TV2 there was no evidence that the man had planned the crime. “There is also nothing to suggest that there was a situation in the shop that triggered this.”
GNA