COPENHAGEN, July 5 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A Copenhagen court remanded into a psychiatric care facility the 22-year-old suspect accused of shooting dead three people in a shopping mall at the weekend, police said.
“The court remands the 22-year-old in a closed psychiatric ward,” Copenhagen police wrote on Twitter, following a two-hour hearing involving the suspect.
The suspected perpetrator of the attack, which took place late on Sunday afternoon, would be kept in custody for at least 24 days, which can then be extended, according to police.
The young man was brought before a judge at midday at the Copenhagen district court on Monday.
Wearing a blue T-shirt, he listened as the indictment for murder was read out, before the hearing continued behind closed doors.
According to public broadcaster DR, citing several unnamed sources, the suspected gunman had tried to reach a psychological help line shortly before the attack, but authorities would not confirm this.
Copenhagen police chief Soren Thomassen had already told a morning press conference that the “suspect is also known among psychiatric services”, but declined to comment further.
The attack occurred on the heels of the city playing host to the start of the Tour de France cycling competition and seeing the return of the Roskilde music festival after being cancelled due to Covid-19 curbs.
“I think we have rarely experienced such a violent contrast as yesterday,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said as she arrived to pay tribute to the victims at the scene.
“But today I think we must pay tribute to the victims, show our sympathy, our help and support, and support all those who have been affected,” she told reporters.
The three killed have been identified as two Danish teens, a girl and boy both aged 17, and a 47-year-old Russian living in Denmark.
Another four were injured in the shooting: two Danish women, aged 19 and 40, and two Swedes, a 50-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl.
About 20 more were lightly injured in the panicked evacuation after the shooting.
The shooting occurred Sunday afternoon at the busy Field’s shopping mall, located between the city centre and Copenhagen airport.
According to police, the shooter was armed with a rifle, a pistol and a knife, and while the guns were not believed to be illegal, the suspect did not have a licence for them.
The mall was busy because of a planned concert with British singer Harry Styles at the nearby Royal Arena that had sold 13,500 tickets but was cancelled at the last minute.
The shooting came just over a week after a gunman opened fire near a gay bar in Oslo in neighbouring Norway, killing two people and wounding 21 others, though on Monday Norwegian police said they saw no link between the events.
In February 2015, two people were killed and five injured in Copenhagen in a series of Islamist-motivated shootings. — NNN-AGENCIES
